Black Sheep
by WanderingToInfinity
Summary: (DISCONTINUED) On Annabelle's first day at her new school in Paris, an akuma attack occurs and Ladybug and Cat Noir are forced to ask for her help. However, the new hero refuses to give up her Miraculous. Instead, she proposes a deal: she gets to keep her miraculous so long as she helps the heroic duo out whenever there's trouble in Paris and she won't take no for an answer.
1. The New Girl

**Chapter One - The New Girl**

Marinette was in Adrien's arms, holding him tight. She looked up and him and sighed, dreamily. She could hardly believe that she mustered the courage to ask him out, so when he said yes she thought that she would die from shock on the spot. She looked up into his beautiful green eyes and smiled.

"I love you, Adrien," she whispered.

Adrien opened his mouth to speak, but words didn't leave his mouth. Instead all Marinette could hear was a loud blaring noise that sounded a lot like her alarm.

Her alarm. She was late for school.

Marinette's eyes snapped open and she leaped out of bed, crying out in annoyance.

"Why didn't you wake me up, Tikki?" The girl asked her kwami as she frantically put her clothes on, nearly putting her head through the arm hole of her jacket.

"I tried, Marinette, but it's near impossible to wake you up when you're dreaming about Adrien."

She froze. "How did you know I was dreaming about Adrien?"

Tikki rolled her eyes. "You were saying his name in your sleep."

Marinette cringed, then quickly pulled up her jeans and put on her shoes before grabbing her bag and purse with Tikki following close behind. She slid down the ladder, out of her room and into the kitchen.

"Don't forget your lunch, Marinette," her mother reminded her, just as she was about to run out of the door.

Marinette stopped and turned around, grabbing the bag from the kitchen island. She thanked her mum and then left the house. She could hear the school bell ring just as she crossed the road.

Thank god I live so close to school, she thought to herself. She had this thought most mornings.

It had only been a couple of minutes since the bell rang when Marinette got to the door to her classroom. Thankfully, Miss Bustier hadn't arrived yet and she could slip into class and into her seat next to Alya without making a big deal out of it. However, when she opened the door, there was a girl she had never seen before sitting on her desk with all her other classmates crowding round her, except for Lila who seemed to be sulking in her seat at the back.

"You've really been to London? Was it romantic?" Rose asked.

"Yeah I've lived there my whole life until now," the girl said. "And I wouldn't quite call it romantic. It's really nice but I think Paris is more like the city of love."

Everyone seemed amazed by her. Marinette just stood in the doorway, dumbfounded. Great, she 's another Lila in class.

Alya finally noticed her best friend standing by the door. "Hey Marinette."

She snapped out of her trance and looked at Alya. The new girl turned to look at Marinette, jumped off the desk and walked over to her.

"You must be Marinette. Everyone's been saying so much about you." The girl smiled and held out a hand. "My name's Annabelle. I moved to Paris last week from England."

Marinette hesitated, but took Annabelle's hand. She finally got a good look at her. Her outfit was bright and quirky, consisting of a green play suit and flower patterned shirt underneath with big platformed shoes to tie it together. Marinette had to admit it was unusual at a first glance, but still looked nice. The outfit actually made her look even more welcoming than she already did with her warm brown eyes and kind smile. Marinette didn't trust it.

"It's nice to meet you, Annabelle." Marinette smiled, slight forced.

"I could hardly tell she was English. Her French is basically flawless," Kim chimed.

"I know and her accent's so good," Nathaniel added.

Juleka muttered something inaudible, but Annabelle seemed to understand it and she laughed, slightly embarrassed.

"I've just been studying French for a long time. It's not even that good." She laughed awkwardly again, responding perfectly.

"Why did you even move to France?" Mylenne asked.

"My dad has to for work and I wanted to go with him. My mum and sister are still back in the UK though. They don't know any French and my mum doesn't want to leave her job. They still said they'd visit us. They both love Paris nearly as much as I do." Annabelle smiled.

"Well it's a pleasure to have you in our class, Annabelle," Adrien said, placing his hand on her shoulder.

If Marinette didn't trust Annabelle before, she definitely didn't now. She wasn't even aware that she was grinding her teeth until Alya poked her in the ribs.

"Chill out, girl," she whispered. "She's only been in school an hour and she definitely hasn't made any moves on you know who yet."

Marinette turned to Alya before opening her mouth and stammering until she could finally get a sentence out. "That definitely wasn't what I was thinking."

Alya roller her eyes. "Sure."

Chloé, who had remained uncharacteristically quiet until now, finally spoke. "Did you really love from England? You wouldn't be the first newbie in this class to lie about yourself." She very obviously looked in Lila's direction, who rolled her eyes and folded her arms.

"Chloé," Adrien interjected, but Annabelle shook her head and smiled.

"No, it's fine. I really did live in England. I even have pictures if you don't believe me, or you could ask my dad."

Chloé looked suspicious of her for a moment, then seemed satisfied with her answer and huffed. "Fine. Just promise me you'll take me around London one day."

Annabelle laughed and nodded. "Sure thing."

Everyone else in the class became excited and asked Annabelle if she would show them around London as well. She had no choice but to agree to all of them. Marinette just stayed quiet and watched. Then, Miss Bustier entered the classroom.

"Sorry I'm late everyone. This morning's meeting overran. Now settle down and take your seats."

Everyone sat down, except for Annabelle who looked lost. Miss Bustier looked at her and smiled, placing a hand on each shoulder.

"Of course. Everyone, this is Annabelle Everett. She moved here from England and she'll be in our class until the end of the year." She pointer to the last empty seat in the class near the back . "You can sit next to Ivan in the second row from the back."

She walked over to her seat next to Ivan. Even though he seemed scary on the outside, Annabelle knew he was nice. Also she noticed that he was always looking in Mylenne's direction whenever he thought no one else could see.

Class went by smoothly until the very end, just as Miss Bustier was about to wrap things up when Rose screamed and pointed out the window. A girl wearing a bright green and violet outfit flew past and the window slowly began to be covered with vines. Adrien and Marinette suddenly sat up straight which Annabelle noticed, but didn't understand.

"What's going on?" She asked, sounding worried and confused.

"Everyone stay calm. It's another akuma attack. I'm sure Ladybug and Cat Noir will sort everything out soon," Miss Bustier informed the class, but no one was listening. Everyone was running out of the classroom to get a better look at what was going on, except for Annabelle who remained in her seat.

"What? Who are Ladybug and Cat Noir?" But everyone had already ran out of the classroom, with Miss Bustier following behind trying to get her students to calm down.

Amongst the chaos, Marinette and Adrien could slip away unnoticed to transform and soon enough, Ladybug and Cat Noir were on the scene.

Annabelle left the classroom when everything had died down a little bit. She heard a cartoonishly evil voice say something about her garden being destroyed and that she was going to take revenge by turning the whole city into her garden instead. It made no sense.

But as soon as she left the safety of the classroom, Annabelle began to get a rough idea of what was going on. The entire courtyard had been turned into a dense forest of vines and flowers. She could see people trapped in cages of the rapidly growing vegetation, some trying to pull the plants apart and others remaining paralysed with fear.

She ran back inside the classroom and slammed the door shut. She went back to her desk and hid underneath it. She had to be dreaming. There was no way that this could possibly be real. She remembered hearing something on the news about superheroes and villains in Paris, but thought it was either a publicity campaign or an upcoming film. There definitely weren't superheroes the last time she came here.

Her phone began to vibrate and she looked at it. It was a phone call from her dad.

"Hello? Dad?" She asked as she answered the call.

"Annabelle? Are you alright?" Her dad sounded deeply worried.

"Yeah, I'm fine. What about you?"

"I'm ok. Don't worry about me. Do you know what's going on?"

"I have no idea." Then her phone cut off.

She looked at the screen and saw there was no signal. The vine things must've cut it off. She closed her eyes and curled up tighter under the desk, hoping for everything to be over soon.

Suddenly, the door to the classroom opened. Annabelle gasped and quickly put her hand over her mouth. Then she heard a vaguely familiar voice.

"Is Annabelle Everett in here?"

Annabelle peered over the desk and saw a girl standing by the door. She was in a red bodysuit with black polka dots and a matching mask and she looked familiar somehow. She was holding a small octagonal box.

"Who are you? What's going on?" Annabelle didn't move from her peering stance.

The girl smiled. "Don't worry. I'm Ladybug and I'm going to stop this super villain. However, I am going to need your help."


	2. Failing the Battle

**Chapter Two - Failing the Battle**

Ladybug tried to throw her yoyo up to swing out of school, but the vines were too dense and there was nothing that her yoyo could properly grab onto and even if there was, she would swing straight into one of the vines.

"I guess I'm walking," she sighed.

However, as she got closer to the vines, Ladybug began to notice that people were trapped inside them. She shuddered, thinking back to when her dad was akumatised. Some of the trapped people cheered when they saw her and others were asking for help, but Ladybug heard one annoyingly familiar voice say:

"If you had called on Queen Bee earlier, I'm sure none of this would have happened."

Ladybug rolled her eyes.

"I promise to get all of you out of here soon." She said, which was followed by cheers. "And Chloé, it's still too dangerous to give you your miraculous. You know this."

Chloé scoffed. "Just let me know when I can because I'm sure that you'll be much better off without me."

Ladybug sighed. "I'll keep that in mind."

She ran out of the school and finally used her yoyo to get onto a roof and get a better look at what was going on.

"The school is almost completely covered in those vines," Ladybug murmured to herself. "Everything else is growing out from there, so that must be where that girl got akumatised."

"I suppose you could say that the problem seems to be stemmingfrom there, My Lady?"

Ladybug groaned and turned around to see Cat Noir leaning on his stick with a cheshire grin on his face.

"Please stay serious, Kitty. This power if very similar to my da- uh - Weredad's power so the people inside there won't be able to get out without your Cataclysm or my Miraculous Ladybug. We need to act fast before the whole of Paris becomes a jungle."

"Sure was thing, My Lady. What's the plan?"

"Well, we need to find whoever's causing this first and then-"

Before she could finish her thought, Ladybug was interrupted by shrill manic laughter. The two superheroes looked up and saw a girl dressed in purple and green with vines and flowers wrapped around her arms and shoulders. She was being held up in the air by the now rapidly spreading vines.

"I'm Devine and I'm going to make the whole of Paris my own personal garden. But before that, you two have something that I need."

She spun around, pouring water onto the vines using a purple watering can and the vines grew faster. Then, they changed their direction towards Ladybug and Cat Noir.

"Cat Noir, look out!" Ladybug yelled, but it was too late; Cat Noir already had his arms and legs constricted by the plants.

He tried to pull himself free, but to no avail. Ladybug tried to run over to help him, but got distracted by a rose that was thrown at her and quickly had to dodge. He had no choice but to use his cataclysm. The vines quickly turned to dust and he ran over to help Ladybug, using his stick to deflect the roses thrown his way.

"What's the plan, My Lady?"

"The akuma has to be in her watering can, we just can't get to it because of those vines."

As if she had summoned it, one of the vines lurched towards her and knocked the yoyo out of her hand when she tried to deflect it. Cat Noir managed to knock it away from both of them, but his stick wasn't strong enough to break it. He had to keep pushing against it with his stick and when Ladybug tried to help, he turned her down.

"Get your yoyo. We need your Lucky Charm, otherwise there's no way we can win this."

"But Cat-" she interjected. He shook his head and smiled.

"I'm fine, My Lady. I can fight this plant off myself."

He finally pushed the vine away from him and smiled triumphantly, but it was short lived as more began to pursue him. Ladybug tried to help again, but he refused again, more forcefully this time.

"Just go!"

Ladybug jumped down from the roof and ran towards her yoyo, which had landed in the road. As soon as she picked it up, she activated her lucky charm and got...

...a gramophone?

She looked around, hoping that something would click so she knew how to use it, but found nothing. Then it hit her.

She looked at Cat Noir. He was still struggling to fight off the vines and there were six chasing him now. She couldn't just leave him there. He had already used his Cataclysm and would de-transform in about three minutes now. Then she thought of a plan.

Ladybug used her yoyo to hold the vines the vines together and pulled them away from Cat Noir. Devine scoffed and turned her attention towards Ladybug with a sinister smile.

"If you wanted to become a part of my garden so much, then you should've just said so."

She spun around, letting water from her watering can land on the plants around her. That was Ladybug's cue to run.

She headed back towards the school, slipping into the jungle at the entrance. Cat Noir followed suit with Devine close behind. Ladybug grabbed him and pulled him behind a pillar to hide. They didn't move until Devine was out of sight and they slipped into the locker room, making sure to be as quiet as possible.

"What's the plan, My Lady?" Cat Noir asked.

She responded by showing him the polka dot gramophone. "My Lucky Charm is telling me to get another Miraculous from Master Fu. You stay here and recharge your kwami."

"Got it."

"I'll meet you at the entrance of the school in five minutes."

She ran out of the locker room, leaving Cat Noir seconds before his transformation disappeared on his own. Adrien sighed and Plagg groaned.

"So... hungry... might... die..." the black kwami complained.

Adrien took out a piece of camembert from his pocket and threw it towards Plagg, who swallowed it whole.

"Yeah, yeah, hurry up. Ladybug's gonna need us soon."

* * *

Marinette had just reached Master Fu's place. She had to de-transform to get there without being noticed by Devine, so it took her longer than she had hoped. When she had reached the door, she was out of breath whilst Tikki was happily eating a macaron.

She knocked on the door, but there was no answer. She knocked again, but still got no response. She knocked louder this time.

"Hello? Master Fu? It's me, Marinette."

"Marinette?" She heard someone from the other side, then the unlocking of at least four locks on the door.

Master Fu sighed in relief. "It is you, Marinette. Come in."

She walked inside, but looked back at the door when it was closed, looking at the excessive locks that weren't there before.

"What's with all the locks, Master Fu?"

"Ever since Hawk Moth has been getting closer to finding me, I can no longer afford to take any chances," he said, walking towards the gramophone. "I am guessing you need a new Miraculous?"

Marinette nodded and Master Fu unlocked the gramophone, revealing the Miraculous box. He held it out to her.

She held her hand over the magical pieces of jewellery. "The vines that keep growing are too strong, so I'm going need someone stronger," she said, picking up two earring in the shape of goat horns.

She held them out to Master Fu and he nodded. "A wise choice."

Marinette got up to leave, but was told to wait.

"Just be aware that whatever happens is for the greater good."

She didn't know what he meant by that, but she smiled anyway.

"Don't worry, Master. I'm know that I'm making the right choice."

With that, Marinette left, leaving Master Fu to hope that she didn't forget what she said.


	3. The Rookie

**Chapter Three - The Rookie**

Annabelle stared at the black and red box in her hand, then at the black and red superhero in front of her. Then she looked at the box again.

"Could you explain all of that again, please?" She smiled, looking embarrassed and still confused.

Ladybug groaned and put a hand to her face, shaking her head. She had originally wanted to give the Miraculous to Nathaniel, but he was trapped in the vines like everyone else. The only person in the whole school who wasn't trapped was Annabelle.

At least it wasn't Lila, Ladybug kept reminding herself.

"Just open the box and your kwami will explain," she told her.

Annabelle was about to ask what a kwami was, but saw the annoyed look on the superhero's face and decided against it. Slowly, she opened the lid and was blinded by the light that came out from it. Something came out of the box and whizzed around her head a few times, then materialised in front of her.

"Hello," the thing said. "I'm Ziggy, your kwami."

Annabelle stared at Ziggy, looking even more confused. It looked like a goat, but it was ten times too small and floating.

"What..."

Ziggy continued. "All you need to do to transform is put those earrings on and say 'Ziggy, horns out'!"

Unlike everyone else who had received a kwami, Annabelle kept staring blankly at Ziggy. Ladybug rolled her eyes. She felt like this was already a mistake.

"Annabelle." She snapped out of her trance and looked up. "Just do what the kwami says and I'll explain on the way. We need to help Cat Noir."

She nodded and put the earrings in, taking out her other ones first. Hesitantly, she opened her mouth and said: "Ziggy, horns out."

Suddenly, she was enveloped in light. Her clothes began to disappear andwere replaced by a black and white spandex-like outfit. A mask materialised on her face, horns sprouted from her head and a shepherd's crook appeared on her back. Even her pupils changed from round to two horizontal slits. Then everything went back to normal, and she was standing back in the classroom.

"What just happened?"

Ladybug sighed and grabbed the new superhero's hand, dragging her out of the classroom towards her meeting place with Cat Noir.

"Like I said, you now hold the power of the Goat Miraculous which gives you the power of strength. To activate it, you need to say 'Level Up' and you'll have that strength for five minutes. However, once those five minutes are up you'll de-transform and your kwami will need time to recharge, but when that happens you'll return the Miraculous to me."

"Right," Annabelle replied, just about understanding this time. "I think I get it now."

Ladybug sighed in relief, slowing down as they got to the school entrance.

"But what about the flower girl? What happened to her?"

Ladybug was so close to giving up and handing over her Miraculous to Hawk Moth if it meant that she didn't have to work with Annabelle.

"She's been akumatised. Seriously, how do you not know about any of this?!"

"I had heard about this stuff in England, but no one believed it. Anyway, there's too much coverage on Brexit really so all other news is irrelevant."

Ladybug rolled her eyes. Thankfully, Cat Noir was already waiting for them. He bowed when he saw the two ladies walking his way.

"Why hello, My Lady." He tried to take Ladybug's hand to kid it but she pushed him away on his nose.

"Not now, Kitty," she smiled, playfully.

He seem slightly dejected, but brushed it off. "And who might this be?" He looked at Annabelle

"Oh, I'm Annabelle," she said, nonchalantly.

Cat Noir immediately burst out laughing and Ladybug groaned again. Annabelle didn't understand what was so funny.

"You can't use your real name otherwise Hawk Moth would find out and you'd be in danger."

Annabelle felt her ears heat up in embarrassment. She felt like such an idiot and she hadn't even done anything yet. But she knew that Ladybug chose her for a reason and she didn't want to let her down. Even if she still had no idea what was going on or how it was happening, she still wanted to try.

She brushed off her embarrassment, then stood up straight and smiled. "Then call me Black Sheep."

Cat Noir smiled and bowed again. "A pleasure to meet you, Miss Black Sheep." He took her hand and kissed it, making Black Sheep blush and laugh, nervously.

Ladybug cleared her throat. "Could you two stop flirting so we can get on with this?"

Black Sheep retracted her hand and laughed, embarrassed. Cat Noir looked slightly offended.

"I'd never flirt with anyone but you, Bugaboo."

She smiled and rolled her eyes, but the moment was suddenly interrupted by a cartoonishly evil laugh. All three of them looked up to see Devine.

"It looks like you forgot about me. So much for the heroes who are meant to be saving Paris."

She poured water on one of the vines she was standing on and it lurched directly towards the superheroes on the ground. Cat Noir dodged out the way and Ladybug threw her yoyo up to swing herself away, scooping up Black Sheep who looked too stunned to move. They both landed on a roof and Cat Noir quickly joined them.

"What's the plan, My Lady?" He asked as he landed.

"You two distract Devine whilst I call on my Lucky Charm and we'll go from there."

They nodded and turned towards Devine, who was already preparing her next attack.

"Hey cat boy," Black Sheep said. "I have no idea what I'm doing."

Cat Noir smiled. "Don't worry. Just use your shepherd's crook to fight off the vines."

She nodded and took the crook from behind her back.

"If it gets too much then you can extend it to get out of here, like so." He demonstrated with his stick and she tried it as well, but extended it too much and hit herself in the face with it. Cat Noir laughed and she made it go back to its normal length.

"Thanks, cat boy."

"My pleasure, sheep girl."

Then a vine came down to them and they just about dodged in time. They were able to fight the vines away, until Devine began throwing roses at them. Ladybug saw that they were struggling and quickly called on her Lucky Charm again. This time she got a large fishing net. As soon as she knew what to do she joined the others, putting her Lucky Charm around her waist.

"Are you sure that this is going to work?" Black Sheep asked. "It seems pretty convoluted."

Cat Noir placed a hand on her shoulder. She couldn't quite place why, but this action felt very familiar. "Don't worry, Ladybug's plans always work."

"Then let's go!" Ladybug exclaimed, throwing her yoyo towards Devine.

Obviously the super villain deflected the attack with a vine, but it was just as Ladybug expected. She had been too distracted to notice Black Sheep and Cat Noir going towards the base of her platform of plants.

"Level Up!" Black Sheep yelled as she activated her power. She suddenly felt much stronger, even though she didn't notice any physical changes.

Before she could get distracted, she stuck to the plan and pulled the huge plant stem out of the ground. Devine gasped as her platform suddenly became unstable.

"If you think that this will stop me, then think again," she smiled as she got ready to prepare another attack, but Ladybug was faster.

Her hand was pulled away by a yoyo and the watering can fell to the floor before it could water anything. But it wasn't over yet, as she began to control the vines to bring the akumatised object back up to her hand, huffing in annoyance, Black Sheep held the stem over her head and swung it in Ladybug's direction. Devine flew off the platform and into the fishing net, guided by Ladybug's yoyo. Finally, Cat Noir activated his Cataclysm, destroying the watering can and causing a black and purple butterfly to fly out of it.

The akuma was quickly captured and de-evilised and Ladybug threw her Lucky Charm into the air, restoring peace to the city of Paris and leaving a girl on the floor very confused as to what had just happened. As if turned out, she was a volunteer for the school garden, but when she went to work on it during break she found out that the garden would soon be replaced by a school gym for a certain student as ordered by the mayor. Thankfully, everything was sorted out and the garden was going to stay, so Chloé would have to have a gym elsewhere.

After the battle had ended, Ladybug led Black Sheep to a secluded area so she could de-transform.

"Thank you for your help, but now you need to return the Miraculous to me," the superhero said, holding out a hand.

Black Sheep blinked. "Wait, I don't get to keep this?"

Ladybug smiled, her annoyance returning from before. "No, like I said, after the akuma was defeated you would return your Miraculous to me to keep it safe."

Black Sheep blinked again. "But it would be perfectly safe with me. Butterfly man doesn't know who I am and would never guess who I was because I'm new here and only just found out about all of this Miraculous and kwami stuff."

Ladybug's eye began to twitch. "His name if Hawk Moth, not butterfly man and that's exactly why you need to give the earrings back to me, because you know nothing about them."

She shrugged. "I have a pretty good idea. I mean I helped you defeat that vine girl and if there's anything I don't understand, I have Ziggy to explain to me."

Ladybug didn't know what to say. The only time that she had experienced something like this was with Alya the first time she became Rena Rouge, but she did the right thing and gave her Miraculous back. But this time, Annabelle was showing no sign of giving in. She knew she couldn't trust her. She had made a mistake and Master Fu would probably never forgive her.

Suddenly, her earring began to beep.

"Ha!" Black Sheep exclaimed. "You're about to transform back, aren't you?"

Ladybug put a hand over her earring and looked around for somewhere to hide so she could wait for Annabelle to change her mind.

"And if you're about to transform back then you can't chase after me, can you?"

She quickly began to leave the alleyway, Ladybug following behind before stopping as the beeping became more rapid. Black Sheep turned around and faced her.

"Don't worry, Ladybug. I just wanna use this power to help people. I promise that I'll always be there to help you two out whenever a butterfly thing attacks. Just trust me." She smiled, placing her hands around hers, but they were quickly withdrawn.

"Annabelle, you have to give you Miraculous back. You have no idea how powerful they are and what could happen if they got into the wrong hands. Just trust me." She held an expectant hand out again.

Black Sheep smiled. "I do trust you, but no can do Ladybug. This is just way too cool of an opportunity to pass up."

And with that, she used her crook to extend herself away. Ladybug would have followed after her, but she only had seconds before she de-transformed. She had to think fast on what to do, then thought of a certain cat who could help her out.

"What's wrong, Bugaboo? Missing me already?"

"Listen, Cat Noir. I've only got a few seconds before I transform back, but Annabelle wouldn't give me back the Miraculous and now she's gone and I can't go after her."

Cat Noir quickly lost his flirty demeanour and became serious. "What?"

Ladybug quickly continued. "I know that you have four minutes left so I need you to find her and give the Miraculous back to Master Fu as soon as-"

The line cut off and Ladybug became Marinette again.


	4. Cat Boy

**Chapter Four - Cat Boy**

"Hello? My Lady? Ladybug?"

Cat Noir pulled the receiver away from his face and saw that Ladybug had hung up. Her transformation must have ended and guessing by the beeping of his ring, his would be over soon if he didn't hurry.

He looked around, trying to find where Black Sheep had gone. Then he saw her extend into the sky, before wobbling and nearly falling. He laughed again and went after her, ending up on the school rooftop behind her. She hadn't even noticed that she was being followed.

She sat down and sighed, ignoring her beeping earring and looked at the school below. She didn't understand how the vines disappeared when a bunch of ladybirds flew around them and was honestly slightly more grossed out by the sheer amount of insects, rather than impressed like everyone else, but she didn't care. There was a lot going on that she didn't understand today.

"Mind if I join you?"

Black Sheep jumped when she heard Cat Noir's voice. "Jesus, you scared me. I didn't think anyone was there."

Cat Noir laughed again and sat down next to her. "Sorry sheep girl, I'm surprised you didn't notice me following you."

She tilted her head and eyed him, suspiciously. "Wait, why were you following me?" She quickly stood up and took a step back. "Did Ladybug send you after me?"

He stood up and put his hands up. "Guilty as charged. But really, you should return those earrings."

Black Sheep put her hands over them protectively as they lost another bar. "I don't want to. This is so cool and I don't want to give it up now. I promise I just want to help out."

Cat Noir sighed. "Listen, you can still become Black Sheep whenever we need your power."

"I doubt it," she huffed. "Ladybug would just give it to someone else. I'm pretty sure she didn't even want to pick me in the first place. I don't know anything about any of this."

He stared at her, confused. "Wait, seriously? I thought you were just struggling because it was your first time."

She shook her head. "We had heard about the 'Parisian Superheroes' in England, but no one thought it was real. And when that train crashed into Big Ben, like though the actual tower, and disappeared with a bunch of ladybirds, it was passed off as some publicity stunt or elaborate magic trick." She paused. "Wait, should I be telling you any of this. It's kind of giving away my secret identity."

Cat Noir smiled and shook his head. "It's fine. I'm one of the good guys and I know your name anyway."

Black Sheep looked down, embarrassed, remembering her mistake. Her earrings beeped again and her transformation disappeared. She looked at the kwami that had flown out of the Miraculous and floated in front of her.

"And anyway, if I didn't know who you were before, I know now," he smiled.

Annabelle put her hands over her face and screamed. She was completely mortified and now that she had de-transformed, it would be so much easier for Cat Noir to take her Miraculous from her. She moved her hands back to her sides and stared at him. He looked concerned.

"Are you al-"

"You have to show me too," she blurted out.

He was too shocked to respond.

"You have to show me who you are too now. It's only fair."

He laughed, nervously. "I can't do that."

She narrowed her eyes. "Why not? You get to know who I am, but I can't do the same for you? That hardly seems fair."

"Well, it's different. Ladybug and I need to know who to give the Miraculous to."

"Then who gives you yours?"

"No one."

"So you get to keep yours? That's not fair. I should be able to keep mine then."

Cat Noir no longer knew what to say. She had managed to corner him with his own logic. He just stared at her blankly, but snapped out of it when he heard his ring beep. He only had one pad left.

"How about this, cat boy: I get to keep the earrings for one more fight and if I'm totally incompetent or I betray you or I don't want to do it anymore then you get to take them back." He was about to say something, but she continued. "And I suggest you make up your mind soon because if you transform back then we'll have no way to get down from this roof and it won't even matter that I know who you are."

He laughed. "I can't argue with you there, sheep girl." He picked her up and told her to hold on tight as he extended his stick onto the ground below. "By the way, why do you keep calling me cat boy?"

"Yeah, I forgot your name so I just started calling you that."

'Cat boy' laughed again. "It's Cat Noir."

He was beginning to like having her around. He just hoped that Ladybug would feel the same.

* * *

_That useless cat_, Marinette thought to herself as she saw Annabelle walk into the classroom wearing ying and yang earrings, recognising them as the disguised Miraculous as they were different from her original gold hoops. Rose asked her as she walked in if she had changed her earrings since this morning, but Annabelle brushed the question off.

"No," she said nonchalantly as she walked to her seat. "I've been wearing these all day." She smiled and even though it wasn't fake, Marinette thought it was.

She really is just another Lila.

"Hey girl," Alya said, sliding next to her best friend who was glaring at Annabelle who hadn't seemed to notice. "You still annoyed about this morning?"

Marinette turned around. "What? No! Of course not." She was annoyed about this afternoon.

"Well did you hear about the new superhero that helped out with the akuma attack?"

Marinette feigned ignorance, saying that she was trapped like everyone else, and Alya got up a video of Black Sheep hitting herself in the face with her shepherd's crook. The two girls couldn't help but laugh.

"I think we might've finally found someone clumsier than you."

Marinette laughed, nervously. "Yeah..."

"Who's this?"

The girls turned in front of them to look at the blond boy who asked the question. Before Marinette could stutter her way through an answer, Alya responded.

"The new superhero."

"Oh yeah," Adrien said, also pretending to know less than he did. "I think I heard that her name was Black Sheep. She seemed pretty cool."

"Yeah, well, she was also really clumsy the whole time and it didn't look like she knew what she was doing," Marinette suddenly blurted out.

Adrien looked at her, surprised by her outburst. Alya raised an eyebrow.

"I thought you said that you hadn't heard about her."

Marinette because flustered. "I hadn't! I was just... er... going off what you showed me in... the video."

Her eyebrow shifted slightly higher. "Sure..."

Adrien shrugged. "Ladybug was pretty clumsy the first time she saved Paris, but now she's practically invincible." He began to space out, looking off dreamily, but quickly snapped out of it. "I'm sure she'll get better with time."

No one had noticed that Annabelle was listening in on their conversation.

* * *

Adrien flopped onto his bed. He was exhausted from school, his fencing lesson, a photo shoot and saving Paris. Sometimes he really wished he could skip parts of his schedule to sleep. At least he got to see Ladybug after having to wait two weeks.

Plagg flew out from his jacket and pulled out a box of camembert from one of Adrien's cupboards.

"What you did earlier was really stupid," the kwami said, before swallowing a chunk whole.

"What do you mean?" Adrien turned onto his back to look at them.

"The whole thing with Annabelle. Master Fu and Ladybug are gonna kill you."

He rolled his eyes. "They are not going to kill me. And anyway Plagg, what she was saying made sense. I get to keep my Miraculous all the time and Master Fu blindly trusted me."

"Sure..."

"Plus she can't be working for Hawk Moth. She's been here a week and the last akuma attack was two weeks ago. She doesn't know anything about it."

"Whatever you say, cat boy. Just don't blame me when everything goes wrong." Plagg finished his wheel of cheese.

Adrien shrugged, assuring them that everything will be fine. He didn't know why, but he knew he could trust Annabelle. He wasn't about to doubt his decision now and he knew that Ladybug would come around eventually. Or at least, he was hoping she would.

Annabelle entered her house. She still hadn't got used to the place and missed her home in England, but she didn't mind. At least she could live in her favourite place in the world.

"Ziggy, you can come out now. My dad's still at work," she said as she closed the door.

The goat kwami flew out from her long afro-caribbean hair where they had been hiding since the afternoon.

"Woah, your house is so cool." They started to zoom around the room, clearly excited, but quickly stopped. "Sorry, it's been such a long time since I've had an owner and I haven't been called upon for 200 years."

"That's ok," Annabelle started before trailing off. "Wait 200 years? How old are you?"

Ziggy pondered for a moment. "350,026 in kwami terms I think."

Annabelle just stared at them. "How old is that in human terms?"

"A lot older."

They both laughed. Annabelle sat down on the sofa and turned on the TV, seeing the news about Ladybug and Cat Noir saving the day earlier with the help of a new hero, Black Sheep.

"I'm sorry about the name I came up with, Ziggy," she said as soon as she heard it. "I know it has nothing to do with goats but I was under pressure and couldn't think of anything cool sounding and-"

Ziggy laughed. "It's ok Annabelle. I've had worse names and it's nice being able to help out."

Annabelle sank down. "Do you think Ladybug will trust me after what I did?"

"I'm sure she will when she sees how nice and trustworthy you are. She couldn't have saved the day without you and I know that she'll need your help again."

Annabelle smiled, feeling reassured. She looked back at the TV screen and saw her hitting herself in the face with her crook. She really wished that they'd stop showing that.


	5. Music to My Ears

**Chapter Five - Music to My Ears**

The rest of the week had gone by pretty uneventfully. Marinette was still suspicious of Annabelle and spied on her throughout the week, but couldn't find any valid reason to mistrust her.

"It's so frustrating, Tikki," she groaned, leaning against the railing on her balcony.

"Don't worry, Marinette," her kwami reassured. "I'm sure you'll be able to get the Miraculous back from her the next time there's an akuma."

"But Cat Noir was supposed to do that and he didn't. What if she manipulated him or threatened him or-"

Tikki cut in. "What if he just couldn't find her. If he saw her go back into school then it would have been too risky for him to confront her in front of everyone else. We know she can't be working for Hawk Moth so if he found her identity it could have put her in danger."

Marinette sighed and turned around, looking at the sun set. "I guess you're right, Tikki. I suppose Alya just wanted to help out when she tried to keep her necklace."

"What necklace?"

She jumped when she heard a different voice from Tikki's, then checked to see if she had hidden which, thankfully, she had. She then looked up at the source of the voice. It was Cat Noir.

"Cat Noir? What are you doing here?"

He jumped off the railing he was perched on and approached her. "I was out for a patrol when I saw you and I thought you looked rather down," he hesitated. "And it looked like you were talking to yourself."

She internally sighed. He must have not seen Tikki.

"Is everything ok, Princess? Has it got something to do with that necklace?"

Marinette froze and quickly fumbled out an excuse. "Oh, that... well ... um... I showed Alya this necklace I was working on, but ... er... she wanted to keep it so she could... wear it and get other people's opinions on it. But it's fine now don't worry."

He seemed to have bought it. "Then what's on your mind?"

She sighed. She really wanted to tell Cat Noir how annoyed she was at failing to get back the earrings from Annabelle, but knew she could only do that as Ladybug.

"There's this new girl at school and she seems really nice, but I just can't seem to trust her."

Cat Noir tilted his head. "Why not?"

"It's," she paused, "hard to explain. She's trying to help me out in this... um... school project, but I don't really want her to and if I tell her that then she'll get really upset because she's just trying to help."

"Then just tell her the truth," he shrugged. "Like the saying goes: too many cooks spoil the broth. I'm sure she'll understand."

Seeing the genuine look on his face, Marinette knew that he was right. Having a newbie like Black Sheep around all the time would get in the way and might put them in danger.

"You're right. I should just tell her."

He smirked. "Of course I'm right, Purr-incess. I'm always right."

"Yeah right," Marinette scoffed. "I'm sure that Ladybug's the leader for a reason."

He pretended to be hurt. "Oh how you wound me, Princess. I'll have you know that Ladybug mostly follows my lead."

She rolled her eyes and laughed, knowing that it wasn't true. "I'm sure she does."

Cat Noir smiled, seeing that he had successfully cheered up Marinette. Funnily enough, the advice that he had just given her was the same that he was planning on giving to Ladybug. He just hoped that she would take it as well as Marinette did.

* * *

Annabelle was going to go out for lunch with her dad later because she had hardly seen him all week. She wanted to go for a walk with him as well, but he was exhausted from work and was still asleep when she wanted to leave, so she left him a note and went by herself, taking Ziggy with her.

She roughly knew the streets of Paris since she had been there a few times on holiday and school trips, but it didn't take much for her to get lost and Ziggy wasn't much help at directing her. To avoid getting even more lost, Annabelle opted to follow the Seine until they found somewhere they knew. As they did this, they began to hear music coming from a boat in the distance and walked closer. When the boat was in sight, she could see some of her classmates. One of them spotted her.

"Hey Annabelle!"

She smiled and walked closer, before stopping because she realised that she still couldn't remember anyone's names.

"Hey..." she trailed off, staring at the girl blankly and desperately trying to remember any names.

Thankfully the girl caught on and giggled. "It's Rose." Then she pointed at the other people on the boat. "That's Juleka, that's Ivan and that's-"

"Marinette!" Annabelle exclaimed. "And you're Alya, right?"

Alya smiled and looked impressed. "That's two out of five, not bad. Maybe you'll know everyone's names by the end of the month."

Annabelle laughed. "Hopefully."

She then turned to a blue haired boy holding a guitar and tilted her head. She kept looking at him, squinting slightly, then said: "I definitely don't know who you are."

The boy smiled. "The name's Luka."

"Annabelle." She smiled, feeling her cheeks get warmer under his intense but gentle gaze.

"You must be the new girl. Juleka told me about you."

Annabelle cleared her throat when she realised that she was staring. "So, what are you guys doing?"

"We're practicing for our band, Kitty Section," Rose chimed.

"That's so cool. I've always wanted to be in a band."

"What do you play?" Luka asked.

"Well, I play the cello but I also sing," she paused. "And I guess I can play the guitar and piano, but not very well. My dad's a lot better than me."

"You can play four instruments? That's so cool," Alya said.

"Maybe you could play the keyboard in our band. Adrien does it sometimes but he's rarely free," Rose suggested.

Annabelle felt slightly uncomfortable with all of the attention she was getting, but tried not to let it show. "Maybe, but I don't think I'll be any good."

Luka places a hand on her shoulder. She got that familiar feeling again. "I'm sure you will be. It isn't too hard."

Annabelle laughed nervously. "How about I just listen to you guys play for now."

She walked over to sit next to Marinette while they set up. They both smiled, but Marinette's seemed a little forced. She struggled to believe everything that Annabelle had said, but knew she had to trust her more because of what Cat Noir said. She also struggled trusting new people thanks to Lila, but at least with Lila her lack of trust wasn't completely unfounded.

"Are you in the band too, Marinette?"

She snapped out of her trance and turned to Annabelle. "No, I can't play any instruments."

"But," Alya started, "she does design costumes for them. One of them was even on TV." She nudged her best friend.

"Woah, really?"

"Yeah and I can get a picture up for you if you want." Despite Marinette's immediate objections, Alya was already on her phone to find the picture before showing it to Annabelle.

"XY copied those designs and one of their songs once and Luka got akumatised when he tried to defend Marinette."

Annabelle pondered for a moment. "I remember reading about that on the Ladyblog."

Alya and Marinette looked stunned and asked at the same time: "You read the Ladyblog?"

"Well, yeah," Annabelle shrugged. "I thought I should catch up on everything like that so I can- er..." She had to stop herself saying so she could be a better superhero for Ladybug. "So I know what to do next time there's and akuma attack."

Marinette smiled when she heard that.

Everyone had finished setting up and Luka asked what song they should play and since they had just been talking about it, Alya suggested 'I Love Unicorns'.

Annabelle couldn't help but love everything about the song: the lyrics, the music, the performance...

...a certain guitarist.

The whole time she kept her eyes on him, whilst he kept his eyes on a different girl who couldn't stop staring at her. Somehow, none of them noticed.

After the song had ended, Annabelle asked to hear another one before remembering something.

"What's the time?"

"Five past twelve," Marinette said. "Why?"

Annabelle's eyes opened wide and she quickly stood up. "I'm late."

"For what?"

"I was supposed to meet my dad five minutes ago." She picked up her bag and ran off the boat. "The song was really good and I'll see you on Monday," she called out as she ran down the street.

It was barely a few seconds before she was running back towards the boat.

"Could someone please tell me where Nuage Café is?"


	6. Waiting

**Chapter Six - Waiting**

Adrien had just finished his fencing lesson and was sitting on the school steps, waiting for the Gorilla to show up. Kagami saw that he was waiting alone and down next to him. They smiled at each other.

"You were really good today, Kagami,"

Adrien said.

"Thank you. You were quite good today, although your form was lacking in some of your attacks," she responded in a monotone voice.

"Yeah, I suppose I've just been a bit tired lately."

"I can understand. I would be exhausted if mother made me be a model on top of school and training." She gave him a sympathetic smile, then turned to get a notebook out of her bag. "Um, Adrien? There's something I've been meaning to ask you."

"What is it?" He looked directly into her eyes, making Kagami uncharacteristically nervous.

"I..." She took a deep breath and pulled out a pressed rose from her notebook. Adrien recognised it almost immediately as the one he tried to give to Ladybug. "I value our friendship deeply, especially as you are the first real friend I've ever had, but for a while now I've been hoping that we could be more than friends."

His eyes widened in surprise.

"Adrien, will you go out with me?" She held the rose out to him with her head bowed.

Adrien didn't know what to do. He had to turn her down, but he didn't want to make her upset. It looked like she had mustered up a lot of courage to do this, which was unusual for her as she was normally so confident. But he knew what he had to do.

Kagami raised her head when she felt him push away her hands, the rose still in them.

"I'm sorry, Kagami," he started. "But I'm in love with someone else."

For a moment she looked deflated and as if she was about to cry, but the look disappeared as quickly as it appeared. She put the rose back into her notebook and looked at Adrien.

"I understand. I won't pursue these feelings anymore and I hope that this doesn't interfere with our friendship."

A red car pulled up in front of the school and Kagami picked up her bag and stood up. Adrien was about to call after her as she walked away, but she turned around.

"I really do value our friendship, Adrien."

She got into the car and it drove away, leaving Adrien alone.

* * *

After finally finding the café with Rose directing her, Annabelle met her dad for lunch. He also had trouble finding the place, so they arrived that the same time.

It was nice being able to spend time with him properly for the first time this week. Her dad would normally be busy at work and would come home late everyday, but she would also normally have her sister or her mum there. She had already called them loads since moving, but she still felt lonely which is why she was so glad to have Ziggy now. Even though they'd only known each other for a week, they got on so well. It was as if it was fate that paired them together.

It took all of her willpower to not tell her dad about them though, as much as she wanted to. But avoiding to spill her secret became especially hard when the conversation topic turned to the event that happened on Monday.

"So what really happened on your first day with the superheroes and everything?" He asked her, not noticing her growing nervousness.

"Well, there was this girl in another class who nearly had the school garden taken away even though she had worked so hard on it and," she hesitated, trying to work out how to explain without giving herself away. "I guess something happened that made her turn into a super powered villain or something and some superheroes stopped her and saved the day. My class tried to explain it to me, but I didn't really get it." She shrugged, hoping her dad would fall for her ignorance.

Thankfully, he did. "I guess those news stories were true. It's hard to believe there are really superheroes though."

"I know, it's weird. They probably should've shown more coverage of it. It's way more interesting than Brexit."

They both laughed and Annabelle carefully guided the topic to something else. They were enjoying themselves until they heard a scream and looked in the direction it came from. Standing there was an akumatised villain. Judging from the white suit and red horn, Annabelle recognised it immediately as Oni-Chan.

"We need to get out of here," her dad said, grabbing her hand but she stayed put. "What's wrong?"

"Uh, nothing," she said, trying to find somewhere to transform.

"We should go home. It'll be safer there." He began walking off, but once again Annabelle refused to move.

"Why don't we hide inside? It'll be safer because we won't have to run past that villain and we haven't paid anyway."

He couldn't flaw her logic so they moved from their table inside to one right at the back indoors. As soon as Oni-Chan had disappeared, Annabelle told her dad to pay so they could leave and go home. As they were leaving she quickly came up with an excuse to disappear.

"I left something on that boat when I bumped into my classmates. I have to go back and get it."

Her dad raised an eyebrow, looking worried. "I should go with you, it still might not be safe and you could get lost again."

She shook her head. "It'll be embarrassing if you come with me just to get the thing I forgot. I'll text you as soon as I'm on my way back or if I'm in any danger. I promise."

Reluctantly, he agreed and she ran off in the opposite direction as him towards an empty alleyway. Ziggy flew out from her hair as soon as they were alone.

"Time to prove myself. Ziggy horns out."

* * *

Adrien felt bad enough for turning Kagami down, but after finding out that she had been akumatised he barely wanted to transform and have to face her again. Plagg has tried to cheer him up before he eventually became Cat Noir, but to no avail. When Ladybug found him, she was surprised to see him so down.

"What's wrong, Kitty?" She asked, genuinely concerned.

"It's nothing. Let's just get this over with."

She was about to press further, but decided against it. Even if she did try, they would have been interrupted by Black Sheep who clumsily landed next to them. Ladybug was going to pretend to not know that she still had her miraculous, but she didn't want to act annoyed at Cat Noir when he was already clearly upset.

"Black Sheep," Ladybug started. "I've been meaning to talk to you."

She put her hands over her earrings defensively. "You can't have them. They're mine and Ziggy said it's ok if I keep them."

Ladybug sighed, expecting this response and continued. "But you really can't keep hold of those earrings. It's dangerous and-"

Black Sheep cut her off. "Hawk Moth might find out who I am. Cat Noir already told me and he said it's fine if I keep them too."

Ladybug shot him a look and he rolled his eyes and sighed. He knew that if he let it, this argument would go on forever and he really wanted to sort out Oni-Chan before things got any worse.

"I did say that and I still stand by it. I don't see why we can keep our miraculous but no one else can. I get it with Chloé and," he paused," Kagami, but Hawk Moth doesn't know who the rest are. Especially with Annabelle."

"He might find out if you keep saying my real name," Black Sheep quipped. Cat Noir snorted in response. "Plus I've been researching all of your other battles and I even knew who Oni-Chan was before today. I'm trying to make sure that I won't get in your way."

Ladybug sighed. They both made good arguments, but she had to keep reminding herself what Cat Noir told her last night: too many cooks.

"I understand all that, but the truth is Black Sheep that we sometimes won't need your power."

Her face fell. "But-"

"You said you've done your research right?" Black Sheep nodded. "Then you know that Cat Noir and I already defeated Oni-Chan on our own." She nodded again and sighed.

"I get it. I'll just go home." She was about to extend herself away, until she saw Ladybug's open hand. She was about to put her hands over her ears again, but Cat Noir pushes his lady's hand away.

"You can keep those earrings," he said with a smile.

"Cat-" Ladybug interjected, but he ignored her.

"If we need your power then we'll let you know, but you don't have to give your miraculous up."

Black Sheep hugged him tightly. "Thank you so much."

"Stay here and we'll let you know if we need your help."

She nodded, then remembered something. "Oni-Chan is after Adrien. I could go find him and protect him."

Cat Noir froze. Ladybug was about to agree, but he blurted out that he was safe before she could say anything.

"How do you know?" They both asked.

"Because I knew that she was after him as well and took him somewhere safe before I got hear." He was nearly sweating, but the two girls fell for his lie.

Black Sheep say down on the roof. "Then I guess I'll wait here."

Cat Noir smiled at him and Ladybug looked between the two of them, suspiciously.

"I hope you're not making a mistake by trusting her, Kitty," she whispered to him.

"Don't worry, My Lady. I know what I'm doing," he replied with a wink. He did know that he could trust Annabelle, but the truth was that he didn't want to reject another person today.

The heroic duo jumped off the roof in search of Oni-Chan, leaving Black Sheep to anticipate their return, hoping that they would need her help.

But they never came back. Barely ten minutes had gone by before she saw a swarm of ladybirds fly past.


	7. Making Amends

**Chapter Seven - Making Amends**

Cat Noir had argued with Ladybug who should go to Black Sheep. Technically, it should've been Ladybug because Cat Noir wasn't meant to know the identities of the other superheroes, but once again it came down to time and Ladybug had seconds before she would transform whilst Cat Noir had a few minutes. Cat Noir was hoping for this anyway, since Black Sheep seemed to trust him more anyway and he wanted to apologise. He had already apologised to Kagami, but doing it in costume didn't have quite the same effect.

By the time he got to the roof where they left her, she was lying down de-transformed and talking to Ziggy.

"I should've just given back those stupid earrings," Annabelle groaned, burying her face in her hands.

"That's not true. I'm sure they'll need your power again soon," Ziggy reassured.

She scoffed. "Yeah right. I bet they'll just use someone else. It's not like they're spoilt for choice and I'm definitely their least favourite right now."

"I wouldn't be so sure if that."

Annabelle sat up, surprised at not hearing Ziggy's voice. Instead it was Cat Noir's.

"That's twice that you've snuck up on me now, cat boy." Despite her joking tone she seemed quite down. "Where's Ladybug? Didn't wanna see me?"

"That's not true. She was adamant on trying to see you, sheep girl, but I had more time." He showed the two pads on his ring.

"I doubt it," Annabelle murmured. "Ladybug's made it clear that she doesn't like me."

Cat Noir frowned and sat next to her. "That isn't true. She actually came around to you somehow. She was kind of annoyed that I had to go instead of her."

"Why?"

"Well, technically I'm not supposed to know who you are, but you said your real name," Annabelle cringed at the memory, "and I've seen your civilian form twice now. But also, she wanted to apologise."

Annabelle smiled. "Well tell her that it's ok because..." She reached up to take out her earrings.

Cat Noir and Ziggy both cried out to stop her and she did, looking at them weirdly.

"What? I thought she wanted them back."

"It's fine. We both agreed that you could keep the miraculous. You've lasted a week without telling anyone and you aren't working for Hawk Moth, so why not?"

"And if you got rid of your miraculous, you wouldn't have me," Ziggy chimed.

Annabelle moved her hand down and sighed. "Thank you, Cat Noir." She paused. "Wait, why aren't you supposed to know who I am?"

"Probably for the same reason you aren't supposed to keep your miraculous."

She snorted and they both started laughing. Cat Noir's ring beeped and he was down to his last pad.

"I better go," he said as he looked at his ring and grabbed his stick from his back. Then he turned back to Annabelle. "Do you want a lift?"

She nodded and he grabbed her hand, pulling her into a bridal carry. She held on tight to him with her arms around his neck and the whole time he took her home she could feel her heart beating faster than normal. She couldn't tell if it was from adrenaline or something else.

* * *

Adrien felt so much better after apologising to Annabelle. He flopped onto his bed after de-transforming and Plagg immediately went in search for camembert.

"I'm surprised at how many people you've managed to piss off today," Plagg said before swallowing a slice of cheese whole.

He sat up. "That isn't true."

"Yes it is," Plagg retorted with his mouth full. "There was Kagami and Annabelle and technically Ladybug too."

He frowned and sighed. He supposed it was true, but it wasn't his intention. "Well at least I've apologised to them all."

"Kagami doesn't count. She was pissed off at Adrien not Cat Noir. Still," the kwami lay down in an empty cheese wheel that he had claimed as his bed. "Who would've thought that you could be such a heartbreaker."

He was about to say otherwise, but Nathalie came into the room and Plagg quickly had to hide somewhere before he could speak.

"Adrien, are you ready for your photo shoot?"

He sighed and nodded. He had completely forgot about it earlier after having to deal with Oni-Chan and was now dreading the next hour and a half that he had to spend with Lila. The photo shoots used to be boring, but they'd easily be over and done with. However, since Lila had become his father's muse, she spent the whole time lying to everyone else and trying to get Adrien to fall for her. It was annoying to start but over time it kept getting worse.

"Let me just grab my bag," Adrien said as he walked to where Plagg had hidden. "I'm not a heartbreaker, Plagg. I just had to be honest to all three of them and anyway, Ladybug and Annabelle don't like me in that way."

They rolled their eyes. "Whatever you say."

"Did you say something?" Nathalie asked.

Adrien shook his head and walked out of his bedroom.

* * *

It was finally Monday and Adrien felt nervous. The whole day he seemed twitchy and Nino kept asking if he was alright and every time he would insist that he was fine and say that he couldn't sleep last night. That part wasn't a lie at least.

It finally got to his fencing lesson and he was doing terribly. His hands couldn't stop shaking. As it got closer and closer to when he'd have to face Kagami, he kept getting more and more nervous. He knew that she got akumatised over him and he was worried if that meant she hated him now.

As soon as he saw Kagami's red uniform, he took a deep breath and walked towards her.

"Kagami, I-" He started, but Kagami cut him off.

"Shall we?" She asked him as she got into the en garde position.

He nodded awkwardly, pulling down his helmet, and got into the same stance.

"En garde, prêt, allez!"Kagami said, charging towards him.

Adrien was still off guard from his nerves, especially now that he was in front of the girl he wanted to talk to all day, and Kagami immediately got him in the chest. She sighed and pulled up her helmet.

"That was way too easy," she joked.

He looked down, embarrassed, and sighed, pulling his helmet up too. He felt even more nervous now and she could see it clearly with the look on his face.

"What's wrong?" She put her hand on his shoulder.

Adrien looked around and saw that Mr D'Argencourt was distracted by other students. He grabbed her hand and pulled her into the locker room so they were alone. Kagami was even more concerned now.

"Adrien, what's going on?"

"I'm sorry."

She was taken aback. "About what?"

"For rejecting you the other day. I know you said that it was fine, but then you got akumatised and I knew that it was my fault but-"

"Adrien," she put her hand on his shoulder again and smiled. "It's fine. I was upset but now I'm over it. Even if I can't have you as a boyfriend, I still want you to be my friend."

He sighed in relief and sat down. "I was so worried that you'd hate me."

Kagami laughed and sat next to him. "I could never hate you, Adrien."

They both smiled. Adrien felt like a huge weight had left his chest.

"I want a rematch." He said.

"You're still gonna lose." She replied, leaving the locker room.

"We'll see about that."

They both laughed.


	8. Jealousy

**Chapter Eight - Jealousy**

"I'm sure they're going to ask for you again soon, Annabelle," Ziggy said to their owner as she got her bag out of her locker.

"Yeah, well I'm sure Chloé thinks the same."

Ziggy sighed. It had been two weeks since Oni-Chan and Ladybug and Cat Noir had dealt with at least five more akumas and two amucks. Annabelle wouldn't have thought anything of it, but they had also asked Rena Rouge, Carapace and some other heroes that she couldn't remember the names of.

"I bet Ladybug's more likely to ask for Queen Bee than Black Sheep," she said as she closed her locker door.

As soon as she did that, she saw Adrien standing behind it and jumped. Ziggy quickly hid behind her hair.

"Hey Annabelle," he said.

"Hey Adrien." She had finally learnt everyone's names.

"We're you just speaking English?"

She tensed. She had started to speak to Ziggy in English because she found out that kwamis could understand and speak in all languages and she was relieved to have to speak to one less person in French.

She quickly came up with an excuse. "Yeah... I was just talking to myself. I can't be bothered to do that in French." She laughed awkwardly, hoping he wouldn't think that she was a freak now.

Thankfully, he just smiled and didn't question it. "I was wondering if you wanted to work with me for the English project."

She looked surprised. "I thought that you were going to work with Nino."

"Alya said that they were working together and I knew that Ivan was going to work with Mylenne, so I thought I should ask you."

Annabelle smiled, then eyed Adrien suspiciously. "You're not just asking me because I'm fluent are you?"

He laughed and shook his head. "No, I'm not. I promise. I just didn't want you to get left out."

Although that wasn't a lie, it wasn't Adrien's main reason for asking her. He knew how annoyed Chloé got after constantly getting rejected by Ladybug and he wanted to make sure that the same thing didn't happen with her.

"So when are you free? We could meet up at mine to do it," Annabelle suggested.

Adrien looked down awkwardly. "Actually, I was hoping that we could do it all here."

"Oh," she was taken aback. "That's fine. We could do it at lunch instead?"

"Yeah," he smiled. "I'll see you then."

The bell rang and he asked if she wanted to go to class with him, but she said she needed to get something else from her locker. She opened her locker door and waited until he was out of sight before she closed it again and sighed. Ziggy flew out to see what was wrong, but then saw their owner smiling.

"What is it?"

She looked up in the direction Adrien left in. "I've actually made a friend, Ziggy."

Ziggy laughed. "You've made more than one. You're basically friends with the whole class."

That was true, for the most part.

* * *

Marinette was seething. She was just about to ask Adrien to work with him when she saw him go into the locker room and ask Annabelle. The whole reason that Alya had asked Nino in advance was so they could work together.

"It's my fault," Mylenne said. "I shouldn't have asked Ivan then they probably would've worked together because they sit next to each other."

"No, Mylenne, it's my fault," Marinette sighed. "I should've just asked him in class. He does sit right in front of me."

"Yeah, well there's always gonna be another project in another class,"

Alya reassured her and put an arm around her shoulder.

"And anyway he probably just asked her because she's English," Mylenne said.

"Damn it," Alix interjected. "Why didn't I think of that?"

Marinette frowned. "He wouldn't do that. He probably just asked her because she was gonna be on her own."

"You can work with me, Marinette," Alix suggested.

Marinette agreed, but was still annoyed at herself. She was more confident around Adrien than she was at the start of the year but she still kept messing things like this up. But also, Annabelle somehow kept being a problem. She had apologised profusely to Master Fu, but he assured her that it was fine and that the miraculous wasn't in any danger, yet Marinette still couldn't fully trust her. She knew it was wrong to get annoyed at her about this, but Annabelle was definitely getting on her nerves.

* * *

Annabelle went to the library and waited for Adrien. She hadn't really been in there since joining the school because most of the books she read were in English anyway and decided to look around. She was completely lost in thought when Adrien came up behind her.

"Hey," he said, making her jump again.

She put a hand on the bookcase in front of her and turned around to look at him. "That's the second time you've jumpscared me today."

He laughed a little nervously, realising that he'd done that a couple of times as Cat Noir as well. "Shall we start?"

They started off working quite well. Granted, Annabelle did most of the work because it was relatively easy for her, but Adrien made sure that she wasn't doing everything. They had to come up with a presentation on something about English culture and they both agreed on music, although Annabelle did originally want to do food. They were about halfway through when they started to distract each other.

"So why couldn't you do this after school?" Annabelle asked.

"Well, I'm not actually busy, but my father doesn't like it when I have friends round. He's really strict." He looked down and frowned.

"That sucks..." She sighed and slumped into her chair. "Ever since moving here my dad's been really busy with work and I've hardly seen him. I call my mum and sister from time to time, but they're sometimes busy too and I don't want to bother them. I'd be really lonely if it wasn't for..." she bit her tongue to stop herself from saying Ziggy, "their phone calls."

Adrien smiled, knowing that she was about to mention her kwami and understanding how lonely he would've been without Plagg, but his smile soon turned to a sad one, thinking about it.

"My father's always busy too and my mother..." he hesitated, "disappeared a couple years ago."

Annabelle sat up. "Oh my god, really? That's terrible. Do you know where she went." She shook her head and muttered to herself, "no, of course he wouldn't. She wouldn't be missing otherwise. That was a stupid question."

Adrien laughed. It was the first time anyone's reacted to his mother's disappearance like that. She looked at him awkwardly.

"I bet I sound so stupid right now. I swear I'm smarter than this, today just isn't a good example."

"No, it's fine. You don't sound stupid."He smiled and she smiled meekly back, her ears turning slightly red from embarrassment. "And anyway, you've done most of the work today."

"That's not true, you've done loads." He looked at her with a raised eyebrow and she rolled her eyes. "Ok, fine, it was mostly me. But that's only because I'm fluent. You're still really good."

"Thanks." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I'm better at Chinese but I'm still-"

She interrupted him. "Wait you're learning Chinese as well? I mostly learnt French because I had to in school. I tried learning Japanese as well but I could not be bothered to learn three more alphabets."

"The Japanese alphabets aren't that hard, it's just kanji that can be a bit confusing."

"You're learning Japanese as well." She stared at him blankly.

He shrugged. "It's the same alphabet as Chinese but with different pronunciations."

"Is there anything you don't do? I bet you're a model or something too." Adrien just looked at her and smiled, trying hard not to laugh. Annabelle just stared back, before burying her face in her hands and groaning. "Oh my god, why am I so stupid?"

They both laughed, but their moment was disrupted by a loud crash that came from outside the library. The two stood up and went to the door before stopping and looking at the other.

"It could be dangerous, you should sit back down," they said in unison. "But what about you?" Again, they spoke at the same time.

Although Adrien knew why Annabelle was doing this, she didn't understand why he was doing the same and kept insisting that she looked out. Eventually, Adrien won and Annabelle sulked back into her chair to see what was going on and green and purple vines. Her eyes widened, as did Adrien's.

"What's going on out there?" Annabelle asked, feigning ignorance.

"It looks like Devine again. I should go help the others." He started to leave.

"But-" She stood up, but he shook his head.

"It'll be safer if you stay here, trust me." With that, he smiled and ran off. Annabelle tried to call out after him, but he had already gone.

"Hypocrite," she muttered under her breath before remembering what had just happened. "Ziggy! Do you know what this means?" She asked excitedly.

Her kwami peeked out from her hair. "What?"

"It's Devine. That means that Ladybug will need my help again. Isn't this great?"

Ziggy looked at their owner judgmentally. "I'm not quite sure if it's a good thing that someone got akumatised."

She shrugged. "You can't make an omelette without cracking a few eggs."

"I don't think that expression works here."

"And anyway, Ladybug will see how capable and competent I am and will have no reason not to trust me."

"Just remember, you can't transform until Ladybug or Cat Noir needs you."

"Yeah, yeah, I know." She smiled, barely able to contain her excitement. "I just hope one of them comes soon."

Annabelle was right. Ladybug did have no reason not to trust her after this. That was true, for the most part.


	9. Reveal (part one)

**Chapter Nine - Reveal (part one)**

Marinette had been too busy getting annoyed with Annabelle to keep an eye on the original annoyance in her life: Chloé. Turns out that she and Sabrina had destroyed the roses that had finally bloomed in the school garden out of spite for the school gym not being built and the same girl from a few weeks ago had got akumatised again. She didn't even understand why she wanted a gym so much. There was already one in her hotel.

She had already transformed into Ladybug and was trying to work out how to defeat Devine again. She knew that she would probably have to call on Black Sheep, but a part of her really didn't want to. It wasn't just because she was annoyed at her for this morning, but she wasn't sure how reliable she would be after stealing a miraculous. She still wasn't sure that it was in safe hands.

"Greetings , My Lady." Ladybug was interrupted from her thoughts when she heard Cat Noir's voice. "It seems like Devine's back for round two. Do you think we'll be able to do it on our own this time?"

Ladybug sighed. "I don't know. We should at least try on our own."

Then they heard that annoying cartoonish laugh and turned around, seeing Devine standing on a tower of vines.

"I was wondering what was taking you so long." She held her hand out. "Now hand over your miraculous."

Ladybug and Cat Noir glanced at each other confused.

"No?" Cat Noir said.

Devine sighed. "Well that's disappointing." Then she smiled wickedly. "I suppose I'll just have to make things harder for you."

She whistled and a venus fly trap grew out from the ground. The two heroes watched as it began to tower over them, growing seemingly forever before finally stopping and growling.

Ladybug looked at Cat Noir. "I guess I'll go find Black Sheep."

* * *

Annabelle was so excited to finally be able to help out again. She had left the library as soon as Adrien disappeared and waited for Ladybug in the courtyard in a space that hadn't been covered in vines. When Ladybug finally showed up, she pulled her onto the school roof with her yoyo so she could transform with no one around to see. As soon as she became Black Sheep she was practically buzzing with excitement and Ladybug had to calm her down.

She put her hands on her shoulders and looked directly into her eyes before she spoke. "Listen, Black Sheep. You might've seen senti-monsters before, but you've never actually fought against one."

"I know," she chirped. "But it's fine. I managed to help to defeat an akuma before and I didn't even know what one was."

Ladybug sighed. "I know that, but just be careful. They can be very unpredictable."

"Don't worry Ladybug, you can count on me." Black Sheep smiled and Ladybug had to admit that it was infectious.

Ladybug and Black Sheep arrived just in time as Cat Noir was about to get eaten by the venus fly trap. Ladybug grabbed him with his yoyo and pulled him out of danger.

"Thanks, My Lady," he sais as he brushed him self off. "I was just about to become plant food." He saw Black Sheep and smiled as he turned to her, taking her hand and kissing it. "A pleasure to see you again, sheep girl." He winked.

Black Sheep blushed slightly. "You know, if you keep doing that I'm gonna expect it every time."

Ladybug rolled her eyes and groaned. "Could you too please stop flirting so we can deal with Devine."

Cat Noir smirked coyly. "Why? Are you jealous, My Lady?"

She sighed. "No, Cat, I'm not. It would just be nice if we could defeat an akuma without you hitting on me or someone else."

"Hey, guys," Black Sheep said, but the two weren't listening.

"You say that, but I'm sure you'd miss it if I stopped."

"Um, Ladybug? Cat Noir?" They still didn't respond.

Ladybug scoffed. "Yeah right. If anything I'd be relieved. You know I like someone else and you trying to get me jealous isn't going to change that so-"

"Hey!"

They stopped arguing and turned to Black Sheep who was glaring at both of them, pointing behind them.

"I think we should focus on the task at hand."

Devine and her venus fly trap were standing behind them. Devine thrust her hand down and a vine came crashing down towards them and the venus fly trap followed. They barely dodged in time.

Ladybug then became serious. She called on her lucky charm and got rope. She looked around and then called out to Black Sheep and Cat Noir.

"I need you too to gather as many of those vines as you can."

They nodded and continued to provoke Devine until vines were swarming around them.

"Now activate your power, Black Sheep, and hold onto them."

Black Sheep complied and held onto as many of the vines as she could. If it wasn't for her strength, she would've definitely broken a bone because of how violently they were thrashing against her. Ladybug quickly ran to Black Sheep and tied the vines up. Devine huffed in annoyance. She tried to use her watering can to grow more or let the trapped ones grow longer, but to no avail. She was using up all of her power.

"Devenus," she called out to her venus flytrap. "Bite off that rope."

It complied, but had difficulty trying to destroy the lucky charm, due to its invincibility. Devine got even more irritated.

Everything was going to plan.

"Black Sheep, I need you to trust me on this." Ladybug looked at her sincerely.

She smiled. "I will."

"I need you to hold open that venus flytraps mouth."

Black Sheep stared at her blankly. "I'm sorry what?"

"Just trust me." She smiled and Black Sheep smiled meekly back. "With your super strength you'll be fine."

Black Sheep cautiously walked towards the venus flytrap. It was still busy trying to bite off the rope. She threw her crook at it to get its attention. It turned its head and she gulped nervously. Cat Noir noticed and was about to ask what she was doing before she yelled out to it.

"Hey!" She was shaking with nerves, terrified at the prospect of possibly getting eaten by that thing.

It rose up and growled at her, completely disinterested in the rope now. Devine pointed at Black Sheep and smiled cruelly.

"Go after her instead."

It lunges at her closing it's mouth around her. Cat Noir cried out but Ladybug kept watching, completely confident in her plan. The venus flytrap suddenly seemed uncomfortable and looked as if it was about to throw up. Then its mouth snapped open with Black Sheep holding it open. She looked immensely uncomfortable. Devine screamed in horror and stormed over to the bound vines, desperately trying to untie the rope.

Cat Noir sighed in relief. He would never admit it out loud, but he had begun to doubt His Lady, wondering if she was trying to get back at her for stealing a miraculous.

"Please hurry up," Black Sheep called putting to Ladybug and Cat Noir, her earrings already beeping. "This is so gross. I am not getting paid enough for this."

Cat Noir laughed. "We don't get paid anything for this."

She glared at him. "Exactly."

Ladybug smiled and turned to her partner. "If you would do the honours," she said, gesturing to the vines.

He smiled back. "Certainly, My Lady."

He activated his cataclysm and the vines turned to dust. Devine fell, but was caught by Ladybug's yoyo and her watering can was destroyed, causing her to return to her normal self. A purple rose fell from her hair and Ladybug knew that was where the amuk was hiding, destroying it too. The venus flytrap disappeared and Black Sheep fell, quickly to be caught by Cat Noir.

The amuk and akuma were de-evilised and Ladybug threw her lucky charm into the air, restoring peace to Paris. She then turned to Black Sheep, holding her fist out. Black Sheep smiled and eagerly bumped it with hers, saying 'pound it'.

"I'll let you keep your miraculous," Ladybug said. "Master Fu says that it's ok as well and I really feel like I can trust you."

Black Sheep looked ecstatic. She hugged her, repeating 'thank you' like a mantra. Ladybug looked at Cat Noir, trying not to laugh, and he just smiled back.

Then everyone's miraculous beeped in unison.

"We should probably get going," Cat Noir said.

They said their goodbyes and left in different directions to all go to the same place.

* * *

Black Sheep had gone into the locker room to de-transform. Lessons had started again, so no one saw her clumsily sneak into school. She was just about to say 'horns in', when she heard someone coming. She quickly hid in her locker and peeled out through the slits to see who had entered.

It was Cat Noir. She was worried for nothing. She was just about to go back out, when he heard him say 'claws in' and his transformation fell.

Adrien was standing in his place.

She put a hand over her mouth to stop her from saying anything stupid.

"So... hungry..." a black kwami complained.

Adrien rolled his eyes. "When aren't you hungry, Plagg?" He pulled out a triangle of cheese from his pocket and Plagg quickly swallowed it whole.

"Good point."

Adrien left the room with Plagg who hid behind his jacket, presumably going to class. Black Sheep was still in her locker and her transformation disappeared on its own.

"I don't think Ladybug's gonna trust me anymore."


	10. Reveal (part two)

**Chapter Ten - Reveal (part two)**

Annabelle never returned to class. There was only fifteen minutes left when they both arrived, but that still didn't stop them from worrying. During break, they both looked for her around the school. They bumped into each other in the library.

"Hey Marinette," Adrien said.

"Oh, hey Adrien." Even though she was talking to him, she looked distracted and kept looking behind him.

"Are you alright?" He asked, fighting the urge to do the same as she was.

"Yeah," she sighed. "I'm just looking for Annabelle. I haven't seen her since this morning."

"That's what I'm doing too. I saw her in here last when we were working on the English project together, but I had to," he hesitated, "leave. I'm worried something happened to her during the akuma attack."

"Yeah," Marinette frowned.

The bell rang and they had to go to class, hoping that she'd turn up for their last lesson.

* * *

She never did. She was still hiding in her locker.

"Come on, Annabelle," Ziggy pleaded, pulling on her arm. "Just go to class. Make up an excuse or something."

She stayed hunched into a ball at the bottom of her locker.

"No, Ziggy. I have to change schools."

They groaned. "No, you don't."

"I have to move back to England."

"You're overreacting. Just go back to class and talk to Adrien about it later."

Annabelle looked up at her kwami, panicked. "I can't tell him I know!"

Ziggy sighed. "Then don't."

She buried her face in her hands. "But I can't not tell him either."

"I have no idea how Tikki and Plagg do this," they muttered under their breath. "Do you want my advice?"

Annabelle nodded.

"You should tell him."

"But-"

Ziggy continued. "He deserves to know that you know his secret identity. If someone found out who you were, you'd want them to tell you right?"

She thought about it and nodded again. She rested her head on her knees.

"Also I think we should get out of this locker because we've been in it for nearly half an hour."

She didn't really want to, but she knew that she would have to face Adrien at some point. She sighed.

"Ok, fine."

Ziggy smiled. Annabelle pushed on the locker door, but it didn't open. It must've locked while they were inside it.

"Ziggy we're trapped."

The kwami rolled their eyes and flew through the door, opening it as they did so.

"Voilà."

"I had no idea you could do that," Annabelle said as she walked out of her locker and closed the door behind her. "It could come in handy if I ever want to break into somewhere."

Ziggy laughed. "Yeah, I'm never gonna do that."

* * *

When Annabelle finally turned up to class, she made up an excuse about one of the vines dragging her away from the school and getting lost trying to find her way back. Miss Bustier and the rest of the class believed it, except for Marinette and Adrien. She went to her seat, deliberately not looking in Adrien's direction.

The remainder of class went by relatively quickly, mostly due to there only being 45 minutes of the lesson before it was the end of the day. Annabelle barely paid any attention and kept staring at the back of Adrien's head when it wasn't being blocked by Marinette's. He occasionally turned around, feeling like someone was watching him, which caused Marinette to turn around as well and she had to make a very obvious effort to look somewhere else.

As Annabelle was leaving the classroom, she felt someone grab her arm and she turned around.

"Are you ok from earlier?" Adrien asked. They were making direct eye contact which made Annabelle panic and look away.

"Yep, I'm fine," she assured him. "I guess I still don't know Paris as well as I thought I did." She laughed nervously.

"It's a shame we couldn't finish working on our project."

Then she had an idea. "Well, you can still come round mine later if you want."

He looked confused. "I can't. My father won't let me. I told you earlier."

She shrugged, trying to seem nonchalant instead of nervous. She looked around to make sure everyone had left the classroom before she continued. "I'm sure that won't be a problem for you," she leaned in to whisper, "cat boy."

She stood up straight and saw the shock on Adrien's face. He looked like he was about to say something and the sudden rush of nerves that she was trying to hold down rose up.

"Anyway, bye!" She yelled awkwardly and turned to leave the classroom.

"Wait!"

Adrien called after her, but she had already left and was running down the stairs towards the exit. She was not hanging around any longer. The whole time she was running she could hear Ziggy trying not to laugh and when she was far enough from the school they stopped trying to stop themself. Annabelle rolled her eyes.

"Please shut up."

Ziggy didn't. Annabelle waited until her kwami's fit of laughter stopped which took quite a long time.

"I can't believe you told him like that." They started to laugh again, but stopped when they saw Annabelle glaring at them.

"I didn't know how else to do it." She sighed. "Anyway, it's done now. I just hope he got what I was getting at."

"It'd be really funny if he didn't."

"Oh my god, shut up."

* * *

Adrien did know what Annabelle was getting at. He was hoping that he was wrong. She couldn't have found out, right? He had always been careful to transform somewhere secluded. He had been Cat Noir for nearly a year now. How could he slip up like this? How did he even slip up?

What was he going to tells Ladybug?

He couldn't. He knew he couldn't do that. He'd have to give up his miraculous and then he'd go back to his normal life, have no freedom and probably never see His Lady again.

"What am I gonna do Plagg?"

Plagg zipped out from behind his jacket, looking concerned. "I don't know. It's probably a coincidence. Maybe cat boy is something they say in England?"

"Maybe, but I don't think that's what she meant." He sighed. "I'll have to ask her."

"Ok, but whatever happens please don't tell Ladybug or Master Fu." The black kwami looked up at its owner with pleading eyes.

He was surprised. "I thought that's what we're supposed to do."

"It is but..." They trailed off. "Don't make fun of me, but I don't want by one else to be Cat Noir. I..." The rest was inaudible.

"You?" Adrien teased.

Plagg groaned. "I really like you. There I said it."

They huffed when Adrien started to laugh.

"I really like you too, Plagg." They both smiled. "Come on, the gorilla's probably wondering where I am."

They left the classroom with Adrien trying to work out how to confront Annabelle.


	11. Midnight Visitor

**Chapter Eleven - Midnight Visitor**

Annabelle couldn't sleep that night. She was too busy trying to come up with an excuse to miss school.

"You're being ridiculous," Ziggy said.

"No I'm not. I'm not going in tomorrow. Now help me come up with an excuse." Annabelle sat up in bed and looked at her kwami who rolled their eyes.

"Just go to sleep."

She shook her head. "Even if you won't help me, dad still isn't back."

"You're just gonna pretend you're asleep when he gets in anyway. What's the point?"

She glared at Ziggy. "I don't want him to know I stay up until he gets home, but I can't really sleep if he's not back."

She got out of bed and looked out of her window. It was nearly midnight but there were still people walking around, including that ice cream guy that everyone kept going on about. _Does he even get business this late?_, she wondered to herself.

She turned around and leaned against the windowsill. "I hope dad's ok. He's never been this late before."

Ziggy floated over to Annabelle and patted her on the shoulder. "I'm sure he's fine. Just please go to bed."

Annabelle sighed and was about to go to her bed when she head something tapping against the window behind her. She turned around and jumped, falling onto the floor. It was Cat Noir.

She held a hand over where her heart was because she thought it was going to beat out of her chest. When she was convinced that she wasn't going to have a heart attack, she opened the window.

"Hello," he said, holding onto his stick that was leaning against the wall. "Can I come in?"

* * *

Marinette had lost track of time when she was working on the English project with Alix. Even though they had been working for most of the evening, they lost track of time because they were playing video games. Alix offered for her to sleep round, but Marinette had three angry and two worried voicemails from her parents who were wondering where she was because it was almost midnight and she thought she should probably go home and it was only across the street

She was waiting for her dad to pick her up when she noticed Cat Noir climbing into a house through the window. What is he doing?, she thought to herself.

She didn't take her eyes off that house until Tikki came out of her purse and asked what was wrong.

"Nothing..." Marinette said absent minded. "I just thought I saw a cat."

* * *

As soon as Cat Noir had entered Annabelle's room, she told him to wait for a moment and ran to the other side and began muttering something to Ziggy. She kept looking over her shoulder at him and it almost sounded like they were arguing.

When they were done, Annabelle stood up straight and cleared her throat as she walked back towards him, acting as if her conversation with her kwami hadn't happened.

"Sorry about that." She side-eyed Ziggy, who rolled their eyes, before looking at Cat Noir. "I'm guessing you understood what I was trying to say earlier."

He froze and gulped nervously. "I don't know what you mean. Did you say something to me after our fight with Devine?"

She stared at him blankly and rolled her eyes. "Drop the act, cat boy. I know you're Adrien."

"That's what you should've said earlier," Ziggy said barely containing their laughter.

Annabelle glared at them. "Shut up. I panicked."

"How did you find out?"

They both turned towards Cat Noir. He no longer looked nervous. He looked completely serious.

"I saw you de-transform in the locker room. I went there to do the same but I heard someone coming and hid in my locker and-"

Ziggy cut her off. "And hid in there for an hour."

She cleared her throat. "_And_ I saw you..."

Cat Noir sighed and then started to laugh. Annabelle and Ziggy were confused.

"What-what's so funny?" She asked.

"Nothing," he said, his laughter calming down. "It's just I've been Cat Noir for a year and nobody's found out, not my friends, not even my father, and then you've been here for three weeks and found me out." He started laughing again.

She looked at her kwami who shrugged their shoulders. "I still don't get it."

He shook his head. "Don't worry. I'm just glad you found out and it wasn't anyone else."

Blood rushed to Annabelle's cheeks. "No one else knows, just me and Ziggy."

He smiled. "Thanks."

She smiled back, then frowned. "Wait."

"What?" He looked confused.

"If you were gonna pretend that what I said didn't happen, then why did you wanna come in?" She pauses again. "How did you even know where I live? I never told you."

"I needed to clear my head, so I went on a patrol and when I saw you look out your window, I thought I could probably clear up what you said earlier."

She narrowed her eyes. "That's a pretty big coincidence. Are you sure you didn't just stalk me?"

They laughed, but Annabelle stopped as soon as she heard the front door being opened.

"You need to hide," she said, running towards her bed. "Now!"

"What? Why?"

"My dad's home and I usually pretend to be asleep when he gets back because he normally checks on me and he cannot know that I let some random superhero into my room at night." She was talking in a loud whisper and had already got under her covers.

"But where should I hide? And I'm not some random superhero."

She could hear her dad's footsteps getting closer to the door and quickly grabbed Cat Noir's tail, pulling him into her bed.

Then her dad walked in. To him it looked like Annabelle had fallen asleep with the light on, but in reality she was in bed with Cat Noir who she knew was a boy in her class. She had to hold him as close to her as she could so her dad couldn't tell that there was someone else in her bed and he could probably hear how close her heart was to beating out of her chest. Thankfully, her dad didn't notice and turned off her light before he left, closing the door behind him.

Annabelle waited before she let go of Cat Noir, mostly out of fear from her dad coming back of he heard something, but partially because she didn't want to. When she did, she turned away from him and buried her face in her hands so she didn't have to look at Cat Noir.

"Sorry," she whispered. "I panicked." She moved her hands away from her face but didn't turn around.

"It's ok," he whispered back awkwardly.

They remained in uncomfortable silence until it was interrupted by Ziggy's laughter.

"Shut up, Ziggy. My dad will hear you." She grabbed her kwami and put a hand over their mouth to muffle it.

When she looked up, she saw that Cat Noir was staring right at her. She smiled awkwardly and quickly avoided his gaze. He frowned, then had an idea and smiled.

"So, if I know you're Black Sheep and you know I'm Adrien," he started. "That means that we meet up whenever to finish the project, right?"

Annabelle looked at him for a moment, then snorted and put the hand she was holding Ziggy with over her mouth, letting her kwami go.

"I think we could do way more interesting things than that," she said.

"Like what?"

She shrugged. "I don't know, superhero things?" She smiled. "It's nice having someone I can talk to about this."

Cat Noir smiled too. "Yeah, me too."

"What about me?"

They both turned to Ziggy.

"I meant another person," Annabelle lied.

"Yeah, I bet you did..."

* * *

Cat Noir had stayed with Annabelle until she fell asleep. They had been talking the whole time, stopping every time they could hear her dad walk past her room. When he finally left, it was 2am. He did consider sleeping there, but knew that it would cause nothing but problems in the morning and his father would lose it.

He left through the window, went onto the roof and sat down. He still didn't want to go home yet.

He lay down, looked at the stars and smiled. It was nice knowing he had someone he could talk about being a superhero with, even when he wasn't transformed. In a way he was kind of glad that someone has found out his secret identity and he was even more glad it was Annabelle. He felt like he could trust her.

"Ladybug's gonna kill us if she finds out," he muttered to himself, then laughed.


	12. Liar

**Chapter Twelve - Liar**

For the next few days, Adrien and Annabelle quickly became closer. Being able to bond over their everyday and superhero lives made it easy. They had even messed around whilst transformed twice now and got their English project done then, Annabelle going home before her dad would get back each time.

Marinette became instantly jealous, seeing this, despite her desperately trying to push her envy aside. Even if she wasn't jealous, she couldn't help but feel suspicious towards it. Their sudden closeness came out of nowhere the day after Annabelle briefly went missing and she couldn't help but wonder what happened during that time.

But Marinette wasn't the only jealous one. Lila was even more riled up about Annabelle and Adrien's friendship.

"If she thinks she can waltz into school and become instant besties with the most popular boy in school, then she's got another thing coming," she muttered to herself on her way to class one morning.

"Did you say something?" Annabelle asked as she walked past her.

Lila smiled innocently and shook her head. "No, you must be hearing things."

She smiled and walked off, Lila glowering at her from behind.

"Can you hear that?" Annabelle asked Ivan in the middle of class.

"Hear what?" He asked.

"That high pitched sound. It's so loud." She looked around. "Where's it coming from?"

Ivan just stared at her blankly. She looked back at him confused.

"Is it just me?"

He nodded.

"It's probably just my tinnitus," she said and went back to filling in her History worksheet.

"Lila had that a while ago. Do you need to move to the front?"

Then she stared at him blankly. "Why would I need to do that?"

"Doesn't it make your hearing worse?"

She shook her head. "It's just a constant ringing in my ears. Sometimes it's really loud, but most of the time it's really easy to drown out. It's loud right now, but that's just because we're talking about it."

That was when Lila stepped in, not wanting someone to expose her for lying. "It was the same for me, but it was just so loud I could barely concentrate." She tried to sound dramatic in order to persuade her.

"If it's that bad you should see a doctor," Annabelle said, turning round.

Lila had to hold back a smile, seeing the genuine sympathy in her eyes. "I did, but then it completely stopped all on its own. I was so lucky, my doctor was worried that it was going to make me go deaf."

The worry in Annabelle's face quickly turned to amusement. "Tinnitus can't make you go deaf and it can't stop on its own. It doesn't even have a real cure. Are you sure it wasn't something else?"

Lila's pencil snapped.

* * *

It wasn't just that incident that fuelled Lila's hatred. Annabelle had called her out on several of her other lies.

"I'm not saying it's impossible, just unlikely that the Queen of England would ask to meet you randomly."

Lila could barely contain her rage.

"And why would you turn down an invitation to Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's wedding? I'm not a big fan of the Royal Family, but I definitely would've gone."

"I was busy," she hissed, standing up and storming out of the classroom to go to lunch.

Marinette couldn't help but enjoy seeing Lila get called out for her lies. Adrien appreciated it as well, to a certain extent, but was worried that she would get akumatised again.

Unfortunately, he was right.

Lila was barely down the hallway when she saw the black and purple butterfly flying towards her. She smiled and let it fly into her textbook.

"Perfect."

* * *

Annabelle was walking towards Adrien and Nino's table in the cafeteria, when suddenly she dropped her tray. She went to pick it up, but fell over and then couldn't get back up again. Adrien quickly went over to check on her.

"Are you ok?" He asked, offering a hand to her.

"I think so," she said, taking it and pulling herself up. "Although I might've just had a stroke."

They laughed hollowly and Annabelle picked up her tray. She was going to get more food since half of hers ended up on the floor, but suddenly threw some at Adrien. He looked at her confused and surprised.

"I don't know why I did that," she said, staring at the hand she no longer had control over.

Then she did it again, but missed him and hit Nino. When it happened again, she tried to stop herself, but only made her miss again and hit Kim, who seemed excited by it.

"Food fight!"

Annabelle ran towards a table to hide under, not wanting food to get in her hair or to be a part of it. She felt someone grab her hand and saw it was Adrien.

"Let's get out of here," he said, pulling her up.

She nodded and followed him. They snuck out of the cafeteria with ease, due to everyone's attention being on the food fight. When they made it to the hallway, Adrien asked her if she was ok.

"I don't know," she said. "Maybe I actually had a stroke."

He shook his head. "I don't think so. I think this might be Lila."

"You think that Lila gave me a stroke?"

"He obviously didn't mean that," Ziggy said, coming out from behind her hair.

"I think she might've been akumatised," he said.

Annabelle looked down guiltily. "And it's my fault because I called her a liar."

Adrien put his hand on her shoulder and she looked up, getting that feeling again. "In your defence, she was lying."

"She once lied to get Marinette expelled and it worked," Plagg said, coming out from Adrien's pocket. They were eating a piece of cheese.

"Why?" Annabelle asked.

"Because she doesn't like her," Adrien said.

"And now she doesn't like me." She put her hands over her face. "She's gonna try to murder me."

"She isn't going to murder you," he said.

"And how can you be so sure?"

Ziggy and Plagg zipped back to their hiding places on their owners. They turned around and to see Lila, holding an old fashioned book and quill. She was dressed completely in white, her hair was in a bun, she was wearing silver glasses and her eyes were black.

"Lila?" Annabelle asked, her guilt increasing.

"I'm not Lila. I'm Fabler." She smiled at Annabelle, but it didn't reassure her at all. "And you are going to pay for what you did to me."

She wrote something down, but nothing happened. Annabelle opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Her eyes widened and she kept trying, but to no avail. She looked at Adrien with a panicked expression.

"Lila," he started.

"It's Fabler."

"Stop doing this. It isn't fair."

"Oh, it is. She was calling me a liar, so if she can't speak, I can make sure she won't ever again."

"But you were lying."

Fabler glared at Adrien, then her frown twisted into a smile. "Would you rather I went after you instead?" She lowered her pen to the book.

"No!" Adrien cried out and she paused.

"You're right. I should enjoy her silence a bit longer."

Annabelle realised something and grabbed Adrien's hand, pulling him away from Fabler and downstairs.

"You can run, but you can't hide from my words." Fabler called putting behind them.

Annabelle ignored her and kept running towards the back of the school, taking the both into the girls' bathroom. He froze when he realised where they were.

"I'm not allowed in here," he said, feeling slightly uncomfortable and trying to leave.

She rolled her eyes and pulled him into a cubicle with her. He looked down, so she couldn't see him blushing. She wanted to say: _It's fine, no one ever comes in here anyway._

Thankfully Ziggy caught onto what she was doing and said it for her. "Hardly anyone comes in here and I think Annabelle wants to tell you something."

She nodded and tried to mime what she wanted to say. Adrien just watched, not understanding at all. She stared at him blankly. She wanted to scream.

Ziggy helped her out again. "She's trying to say that whatever Fabler writes gets undone by the next thing she writes."

"So if I can get her to write down something else, then Annabelle can talk again," he caught on.

She nodded and mimed something else. "And then she can transform," her kwami translated.

"But what if we don't need you?"

Annabelle looked down disheartened, but then looked up determined. Adrien didn't need Ziggy to explain what she meant. He smiled.

"Don't worry. I'll make sure you'll be able to transform." She smiled back and nodded. "Plagg, claws out!"

Annabelle watched him transform completely stunned, then burst out laughing. Adrien, now Cat Noir, looked confused and embarrassed.

"What's wrong?"

"It's the first time she's seen you transform," Ziggy guessed. "She clearly has no idea what she looks like when she does it though."

Annabelle stopped laughing at glared at them. They stuck their tongue out in response. Cat Noir smiled.

"I'll go fix this." Then he paused. "How am I gonna get out without anyone seeing me?"

Annabelle pointed to the window.


	13. Calling for Backup

**Chapter Thirteen - Calling for Backup**

Annabelle had been waiting for nearly ten minutes. Her voice had come back six minutes ago. From the sounds of it, Cat Noir and Fabler hadn't left the school and Ladybug had arrived too.

Annabelle sighed. She leaned against the cubicle wall and slid down, resting her head on her knees when she was sitting. She sighed again.

"Stop sighing," Ziggy groaned.

"Maybe they forgot about me," she said.

"They didn't," they replied.

"Maybe they don't need me. Cat Noir didn't think they would."

Ziggy groaned again, pulling their face down. "You're being melodramatic."

"That's what you said last time." She let her head slip down, hiding behind her knees.

The kwami perked up, remembering what happened with Oni-Chan. They floated towards her and perched on one of her knees.

"I'm sure it'll be different this time. Fabler doesn't seem easy to take down."

"But she doesn't seem strong either."

"Neither did Devine."

Annabelle looked up at Ziggy who was smiling. She smiled back weakly.

"I suppose you're right," she said, standing up and stretching. "I just wish cat boy would hurry up. I'm so bored."

Ziggy laughed. "Well you have a deck of cards in your bag."

"We could play cheat!" She exclaimed, fishing for them in her bag.

"You can't play cheat when there's only two people."

* * *

"Cat Noir is now a cat."

Ladybug groaned. "Not again," she said as she thought back to her fight with Malediktator.

Cat Noir was immediately on all fours and meowed. He crawled up to Ladybug, rubbing his face against her leg and purring like a cat. She looked down at him and sighed.

"It's a good look on him," Fabler said, smirking.

Her power was seriously getting annoying. Every time either one of them got close to her, she would write something in her book to make them fall over or create distance between them. There was no way they could do this on their own.

Ladybug called for her lucky charm. She got a teapot that she instantly recognised, but there was something attached to its handle. It was a small key ring of a sheep that she knew she'd seen before.

"Ladybug's lucky charm is now gone," Fabler said as she wrote in her book and it disappeared from between Ladybug's hands.

Cat Noir snapped out of his trance and couldn't work out why he was on the floor sitting like a cat. He stood up and asked Ladybug what was going on.

"Fabler just made my lucky charm vanish but I got Master Fu's teapot," she said.

"Ok, I'll hold Fabler off," he responded, holding his stick out ready.

"But there was something attached to the handle. It looked like a sheep key ring. I've seen it before but I don't know where. Maybe-"

Cat Noir cut her off. "I know where that's from."

Ladybug looked back at him surprised from his sudden outburst.

"It's Anna-," he started, but quickly cut himself off before he gave away her identity to someone else. "You know _hers_, Black Sheep's," he whispered.

Her expression didn't change. She had no idea how Black Sheep would help out in this situation, but she wasn't about to question her luck charm. Then her face turned serious.

"You go to get her and I'll go find Master Fu." They nodded in agreement and began to go off in the opposite direction.

"And where do you think you two are going?"

They froze and turned to Fabler, after almost entirely forgetting she was there.

"I'm not done with you two yet."

"Cat Noir, go. I'll hold her off," Ladybug said.

"But-" He tried to protest, but she wouldn't let him.

"Just go!"

He paused for a moment, but then used his stick to extend himself onto the roof. Although it seemed like he had gone completely, he was only round the corner.

Fabler frowned. "Shame, I wanted to see him go back to being a cat." Then she smiled wickedly. "But I've got an even better idea."

She wrote something into her book, but didn't announce it. Ladybug's earrings suddenly started to beep rapidly.

"You have about a minute before you de-transform. Might as well hand over your miraculous right now."

Ladybug looked around for somewhere to hide, them saw the toilets that hardly anyone uses and ran. Fabler scoffed and followed her.

The second she got into the cubicle her transformation fell. She could hear the door open and she held her breath.

"For the last time we cant play cheat," someone said from the cubicle next to her.

Fabler smirked and kicked the door down, only to see Annabelle sitting there on the floor. Ziggy quickly hid and Annabelle froze.

"Oh no."

Fabler smiled. "I might've just found something even better."

Annabelle shoved past Fabler and ran out, quickly followed by the person she was running from.

Marinette sighed in relief. That had been too close.

* * *

Annabelle had ran out of the school and round the corner. She looked over her shoulder for a second and saw Fabler was still behind her. How was she so fast? It looked liked she was floating. Maybe that's why she wasn't writing anything.

She abruptly came to a halt when she rammed into someone. The person had but their arms around her to stop her from falling. She looked up and blushed. It was Cat Noir.

"Sorry... I... running... Fabler... floating... no... breath..." She sais between panting, trying to catch her breath.

Cat Noir looked in front of him and saw Fabler. He held out his stick and held Annabelle tighter as he extended it upwards, causing her to blush even more, but he didn't notice. They landed on a roof somewhere and hid behind a chimney.

She was still trying to catch her breath which had become increasingly difficult with her heart beating as fast as it was. When Cat Noir could no longer see Fabler he turned to Annabelle. He looked concerned.

"Are you ok?"

She realised how much of a mess she must've looked like. Her hair was a mess and she still couldn't quite breathe properly from how quickly she had been running and her face was completely red.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she wheezed.

He laughed, but became concerned when he saw that she was still wheezing. He asked if she was ok again and she nodded, finally catching her breath. That entire situation was too much for her to handle at once.

"I think she's gone now," Cat Noir said after he looked around. "Are you sure you're ok?"

"I'm fine," Annabelle assured him, finally being able to breathe normally.

He smiled. "Well that's a good thing, because..." He didn't finish his sentence, hoping she would catch his drift, but she just stared back at him blankly.

"Because..?"

He rolled his eyes and Ziggy came out from behind her hair to tell her. "He's trying time say you can be Black Sheep, you idiot."

Annabelle's eyes widened. She looked at Cat Noir who nodded to confirm what Ziggy has said.

"Yes!" She exclaimed. "Ziggy, hor-"

She paused, suddenly very aware that Cat Noir was sitting with his legs crossed and head resting in his hands, staring directly at her. It felt like she was transforming to an audience.

"You can't laugh," she murmured.

"You laughed at me," he pointed out.

She rolled her eyes and transformed. Once she had finished, she saw that Cat Noir was biting his bottom lip to stop himself from laughing. She glared at him.

"I'm not... laughing," he stifled.

They had almost completely forgot about Fabler, but seeing Ladybug go past with another superhero in blue reminded them.

"Who's that?" Black Sheep asked, pointing at the blue hero.

"Viperon," he replied. "He can go back in time for up to five minutes after he activates his power."

"What? That's so cool. I wanna do that."

Cat Noir laughed. "Come on. They're gonna need our help."


	14. Snake boy

**Chapter Fourteen - Snake boy**

Black Sheep kept staring at Viperon when she joined him and Ladybug. He looked familiar, but she couldn't work out who he was. It was something about his hair. She'd seen someone with that exact hairstyle before, but who was it? It couldn't be Ivan because his hair was blond and his build was bigger and it couldn't be Kim because he was too tall. Maybe it was Lu-

"Black Sheep!" She was snapped out of her trance by Ladybug and saw that everyone was staring at her. "Did you get any of that?"

For a while she didn't say anything. "What?"

Ladybug rolled her eyes. "I was going over the plan."

"Oh, sorry," her ears turned red from embarrassment.

"All we know about Fabler is that whatever she writes down comes true, but is she writes something else down-"

"Then what she wrote before stops happening," Black Sheep cut in.

Ladybug was surprised that she knew this already, but continued. "So we need to get her to write something down that she won't want to undo. But, she could always write something down like 'Ladybug and Cat Noir give me their miraculous', and if she does we've lost. That's where Viperon comes in."

"I'll use my second chance if it ever gets to that point so we can keep trying and I can say what went wrong," Viperon explained.

There was something about his voice that seemed familiar as well. It made her feel warm and she had to focus on what he was saying rather than the sound of his voice so she didn't zone out again. He activated his power.

"Got it," Black Sheep said. "But where do I come into it?"

"We won't know until we find Fabler," Ladybug said. "But I'm sure we'll know when it comes to it. Let's go."

Everyone nodded and headed in the direction where they saw Fabler. Black Sheep was still a bit shaky at travelling around using her crook and nearly fell a few times. Viperon saw and stifled a laugh. She shot him a glare.

"It's a lot harder than it looks, you know," she quipped.

"I'm not saying it isn't." He put his hands up defensively.

"It's not like we can all jump really high." She paused, balancing on her extended crook. "Wait why is that?"

Suddenly, she lost her balance and started to fall. Viperon jumped off the roof he was running on and caught her mid air. They fell to the ground, Black Sheep being shielded by Viperon. Her heart was pounding, but that might've just been from the adrenaline. She hoped it was just from the adrenaline.

When they landed, Viperon stood up and held out his hand to Black Sheep. "Are you ok?"

She laughed nervously and took his hand. "Yeah, I think so."

Ladybug and Cat Noir noticed that the other two were no longer following them and spotted them on the pavement.

"Are you two ok?" Cat Noir called out to them.

"Yeah, I just..." Black Sheep looked down embarrassed, knowing Cat Noir would make fun of her later. "I just fell."

He snorted and Ladybug just rolled her eyes. The four of them went back to trying to find Fabler, this time with Viperon running alongside Black Sheep. They had no idea how long they had been looking for, but it was beginning to seem like Fabler had disappeared. They gathered on a roof to try to work out where she had gone.

"Maybe she went back to the school?" Black Sheep suggested.

"We've already looked there," Ladybug said. "And I doubt that she would go back because she saw Annabelle run out."

Black Sheep jumped at the mention of her real name. "Yeah..."

"Well where else could she be?" Cat Noir asked.

"How about right behind you?"

The four of them jumped when they heard Fabler. Ladybug and Cat Noir charged towards her, who kept deflecting them by writing in her book. Black Sheep didn't really know what to do and stood next to Viperon.

"What are you doing, snake boy?" She asked him.

He laughed. "It's Viperon."

"Yeah I'm not gonna remember that," she mumbled.

"I'm trying to analyse the situation. If Ladybug thinks we need my power, we won't be able to win at first," he explained. "What are you doing, sheep girl?"

She laughed nervously and blushed. Why was she reacting like this? She doesn't normally when Cat Noir calls her that.

"Well, Ladybug and Cat Noir didn't tell me what to do and if I join them it's not gonna help. If she can see what we're doing then she can just deflect us easily. Really we should just sneak up on her and attack her from behind or overwhelm her from every direction."

Viperon looked at her in surprise. He never would've guessed how quickly Black Sheep would be able to analyse the situation after seeing her fall earlier.

"What?" She asked after he had been staring at her for a while now.

"Nothing it's just," he paused, "that's a great idea."

"It is?" She looked surprised.

He nodded and used his power, taking him back three minutes.

* * *

"Got it," Black Sheep said. "But where do I come into it?"

"We won't know until we find Fabler," Ladybug said. "But I'm sure we'll know when it comes to it. Let's go."

"Wait," Viperon said and everyone paused. "We can't just look for Fabler and attack her from the front because she'll be able to deflect us too easily. We should try to find her and either get her from behind or overwhelm her from every direction."

"That's a really good idea," Black Sheep said.

Viperon has to bite his cheek to stop himself from laughing because it was her idea in the first place.

"Then let's try to find her," Ladybug said. "Do you have any idea where she was?"

Viperon nodded and began to lead them in the direction where she found them, convincing Black Sheep not to use her crook to get around. (She asked him why, but he refused to answer). When they got there, she was no where to be seen.

"Are you sure it was here?" Ladybug asked.

Viperon nodded. "It was definitely here."

"What was definitely here?"

They all turned and saw Fabler. The four superheroes looked around for an opening, but couldn't see one. No matter what they did she could easily deflect all of them just by writing one thing down.

"How did she do that?" Black Sheep asked. "It's like she was invisible before."

Fabler's smirk cracked briefly and Viperon took note. Black Sheep was pretty good at this.

* * *

It was the fifth or sixth time that Viperon had gone back now and he finally had a solid plan.

"Got it," Black Sheep said. "But where do I come into it?"

Viperon started talking before Ladybug could. "We need to split up and have you," he looked at Black Sheep, "lure her out. Right now she's made herself invisible, but once she's written something down she won't be. When that happens you need to give us a signal so we can sneak up on her and overwhelm her."

Black Sheep nodded, along with Ladybug and Cat Noir. They got ready to go into their different directions and before they took off, Black Sheep stopped to talk to Viperon.

"That's a really good plan by the way. You must've had to go back loads of times to work that out."

He laughed and she looked back at him confused. "Actually, I should be thanking you."

He jumped onto a different roof and continued in that direction, leaving Black Sheep standing there confused.

"What did I do in the past?" She paused. "Can it really be called the past if it didn't technically happen?" Then she got lost in thought, trying to work out how Viperon's power actually worked.

She was so lost in thought that she didn't realise that Fabler had snuck up behind her, no longer invisible and holding her pen that now had a sharp edge. Black Sheep yelped when Fabler held it against her neck.

Shit, I wasn't paying attention, she thought. At least I still managed to lure her out.

"Who left this poor, little, defenceless lamb out here?" Fabler taunted. Black Sheep started to squirm, but Fabler held the knife closer to her throat. "I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"You wouldn't actually hurt me, right?" Black Sheep asked. She started to panic when Fabler didn't respond. What if she actually died. Could Ladybug's power bring her back from the dead?

"Just tell those friends of yours to come back here and give their miraculouses to me and hopefully you won't have to find out."

Thankfully, things were still going to plan as before Black Sheep could message anyone, Cat Noir snuck up from behind Fabler and wrenched her hand away from Black Sheep's neck and twisted it behind her back. She dropped her pen and Black Sheep put a hand to her neck making it wasn't cut.

"Are you ok?" Cat Noir asked.

"Yeah," she responded in a way that didn't sound too sure.

Ladybug and Viperon quickly arrived, as no one had strayed too far from the other. Fabler looked concerned. Cat Noir still held her arm firmly in place and her left and right sides were being flanked by Ladybug and Viperon. Black Sheep was still a bit out of it; she couldn't stop wondering if she was about to die or not. Then Fabler smiled. She had a plan.

She dug her heel into Cat Noir's foot so he let go of her arm and stumbled backwards. He knocked the pen away from her, but Fabler didn't care. She drew a pencil out from her sleeve and began writing in her book before anyone else could react.

"Black Sheep is now in a cage."

"What?" Black Sheep snapped out of her daze as she saw four barred walls surround her.

She frantically tried to press on them to get her out, but they wouldn't budge. While everyone was distracted, she took her chance to grab the pen which still had a sharp edge to it.

"Ladybug, look out!" Cat Noir cried out as Fabler lunged at her.

She ducked out of the way in time. _The rules must not apply if she changes what she's writing with_, she thought. She quickly summoned her lucky charm: an eraser. _That's really gonna help against a knife._ Then she had an idea.

"Cat Noir, get Black Sheep out of there," she called out to him.

He nodded and used his cataclysm to do so. Fabler started to write something else down when Black Sheep, now free, lunged at her and held her crook over Fabler's neck.

She laughed triumphantly. "Who's the poor, little, defenceless lamb now? Also I actually have a the power of the goat."

"Then why are you called Black Sheep?"

With Fabler (and by proxy Black Sheep) successfully distracted, Ladybug tried to reach out to get Fabler's book, but she noticed and finished writing whatever she was before. Suddenly, four walls came up around Fabler, pushing her Black Sheep away from her.

Everything was going to plan.

"Black Sheep activate your power and break down those walls," Ladybug said.

Black Sheep activated her level up and was about to kick through one of the walls when Fabler suddenly called something out:

"Black Sheep no longer has any strength."

With that, she crumpled to the ground and couldn't move. Cat Noir and Viperon rushed to help her up, but she slipped out of their grasp and fell back to the floor as she had no strength to hold herself up. It was just like back at the cafeteria, but worse.

Although this had worked perfectly for Fabler, she forgot one of the rules of her power and the walls around her disappeared. She was about to write something else down when Viperon kicked the book out of her hands and it fell to the floor. She dove to reach it, but Cat Noir grabbed her arm again so she couldn't move. Ladybug grabbed the book and rubbed out the last thing she wrote, giving Black Sheep her strength back. Lila pulled the same trick as earlier and got Cat Noir to let go of her, but Black Sheep lunged at her feet and grabbed onto her ankles. The sheer force of her grip alone caused Fabler to trip, landing on face down onto the ground using her hands to break the fall.

All she could do was watch as Ladybug tore the book in half and she felt her akumatised persona slip away.

* * *

"Nice job, sheep girl," Cat Noir said after everything had been restored back to normal.

Black Sheep scoffed. "I didn't really do much. I was kinda useless for most of that fight. But thanks, cat boy."

"That's not true." The two of them turned around to Viperon as he spoke. "We really couldn't have done this without you."

She blushed slightly. "What do you mean? You're the one who came up with the plan."

Viperon shook his head. "It was actually you who came up with everything."

She stared blankly at him. "Yeah, I think I'd remember that."

He laughed. "It happened in the few times I had to use my power. You're actually pretty observant."

Black Sheep was surprised. Could she really have come up with that whole plan? If Ladybug knew that then maybe she would trust her a bit more. She smiled.

"Also you fell over almost every time."

"What?" Her joy vanished almost instantaneously.

"One time you fell into an open sewer grate." Viperon laughed.

"I did what?" Her face started to turn red.

Cat Noir started laughing as well and Black Sheep glared at him. Then they heard a rapid beeping sound. Viperon looked down at his bracelet and saw he only had one minute left. He smiled and walked over to Ladybug.

"Until next time, Cat Noir, sheep girl."

He and Ladybug jumped of the roof and disappeared from the other two heroes' line of sight. Cat Noir still hasn't stopped laughing, so Black Sheep punched him in the arm.

"Shut up."

"But it is really funny."

"Shut up!" She buried her face in her hands and groaned. "At least Ladybug doesn't remember that." She paused. "I hope snake boy doesn't tell her that."

Cat Noir snorted. "I'm sure _he_ won't." He got hit in the arm again. "I'm joking. Don't worry, I won't tell Ladybug. I know you want her to trust you."

She smiled. "Thanks, cat boy."

His ring and her earrings started beeping. "We should probably go." He said, grabbing her hand and pulling her into a bridal carry.

"What are you doing?" She stared at him. She could feel her pulse increase and her face redden again.

"Well, I wouldn't want you falling into another sewer grate." He tried to hold in a laugh and failed.

Black Sheep gave him a murderous look. "Put me down now, you idiot."

He just laughed and kept holding onto her as he took them back in the direction of their school.


	15. Fear Sickness

**Chapter Fifteen - Fear Sickness**

After Adrien and Annabelle had returned to school and she finished yelling at him for carrying her the whole way, they returned to class. The lesson before had been cancelled due to the mess Fabler made so they didn't have to make any excuses.

Adrien sat down in his seat at the front, but Annabelle froze next to his desk.

"Are you ok?" He asked.

She didn't respond. Lila was glaring at her, gripping her pen tightly. Annabelle couldn't stop thinking back to the fight when Fabler held that pen knife against her neck. She swallowed hard and her hands started shaking.

"Annabelle?"

She snapped out of her trance and looked at Adrien, who had just called her name. He looked concerned. Then she noticed Nino did too, as well as Alya and Marinette. How long had she been standing there?

"Yeah, I'm fine... I just..."

Miss Bustier entered the classroom and stopped when she saw Annabelle standing at the front.

"Annabelle, are you ok? Please take your seat."

She was going to, but then she realised that she would be sitting directly in front of Lila and she stopped herself.

"Um, actually, I'm not feeling that great. Is it ok if I go home?" She asked, averting her eyes from Lila's glare and turning towards the teacher.

Miss Bustier looked at her, trying to determine whether she was actually ill or not. Even if she wasn't ill, something seemed off about her and Annabelle didn't seem like the sort of person who would lie to get out of class.

"Well if you're not feeling well then you should go home and rest," she turned to the class. "Someone make sure to give Annabelle their notes so she can catch up."

"I will," Adrien responded immediately.

He looked at Annabelle as she left the classroom and smiled at her. She smiled back weakly, feeling Lila's glare boring into her skull.

* * *

"Are you sure you're fine?" Ziggy asked again.

"Yes, I'm positive. I'm just a bit ill. I haven't been feeling that great all day," Annabelle replied, trying to sound convincing.

Ziggy wasn't buying it. They knew she was lying. "Is it because of Lila?"

She stopped walking briefly. "No."

_So it is then_, the kwami thought to themself.

"Anyway, you should hide. We're in public."

Ziggy sighed and hid back behind her hair.

Annabelle felt her phone vibrate and she pulled it out. It was a message from Adrien, asking if it was ok for him to drop off his notes after school. She replied, saying it was fine, then thought she should probably call her dad to tell him that she had left school early. The phone rang for a while before going to voicemail. She sighed and left him a message.

* * *

She was just about to put her phone away when it vibrated again. It was another message from Adrien asking if she was really ok again. She clutched her phone tightly before putting it back in her pocket without replying.

After school Adrien asked Nathalie if he could stop by Annabelle's after school to deliver her work. At first she was opposed to it, as it would throw off his schedule, but he managed to convinced her as Annabelle's house was on the way and it would only take a few minutes.

He knocked on the door and waited. When Annabelle opened the door she was in her pyjamas, her hair looked messier than normal and her eyes were red.

"Adrien? What are you doing here?" She asked.

"I'm dropping off the work you missed out on." He handed her some sheets of paper he'd torn out of his notebook. "Have you been crying? Your eyes are all red."

Her grip tightened around the paper as she took it from him. "No, it's just hay fever. I forgot to take my eye drops this morning." She laughed hollowly. "Today really isn't my day, I guess."

"If something's wrong, I can try to help," he said, trying to look her in the eye but her gaze didn't leave the ground.

"It's nothing. It's just a cold. I'll probably be in tomorrow."

Adrien was about to say something else, but Nathalie called out to him from the car, telling him he was going to be late for his next photo shoot.

He sighed. "I'll see you tomorrow," he said as he walked back to the car.

Annabelle smiled and and waved from the doorway, but her eyes were still filled with sadness.

* * *

Annabelle wasn't in the next day. Apparently her cold had got worse overnight, but Adrien wasn't buying it. He'd texted her a few times since he dropped off his notes, but she'd ignored most of them. He was about to call her in the locker room, but Plagg stopped him.

"You're being paranoid," they said, pulling his phone away from the call button.

"But she was fine yesterday," he interjected.

"Paranoid," Plagg cooed.

Adrien rolled his eyes. "I'm just worried. She seemed off after we defeated Fabler and when I saw her after school. What if something's wrong."

"If something's wrong, then give her space. She clearly doesn't want to talk about it right now." Plagg ate the slice of cheese Adrien gave them earlier. "And even if you're not being paranoid, you're being annoying. Just give her some space."

Adrien sighed. "Fine, I'll give her space. But I'm going round hers tonight to make sure she's alright."

His kwami sighed and rolled their eyes. "That's literally the opposite of giving her space."

* * *

Adrien wasn't the only one who found a Annabelle's absence suspicious. Marinette was also found it strange when she suddenly left during the last lesson yesterday, even though she seemed fine as Black Sheep and even before that. She had asked others in her class if anyone else knew how she was or if they found it unusual, but only Adrien shared her concern. Everyone else just said it was probably a cold, except for Lila who just hugged and said she couldn't care any less about Annabelle, hoped she didn't come back and told Marinette to stop talking to her (she didn't know why she even bothered asking her).

When she asked Adrien he told her that he'd messaged her a few times, but wasn't always replying and when she did she would wait an hour after her sent the message. It made sense that Adrien would be the most concerned, since Annabelle was closest with him, but that didn't stop Marinette's irrationality kick in and she was a bit jealous.

Alya noticed almost immediately. "Are you jealous that Adrien has been texting Annabelle all day?"

"What? No," Marinette lied.

Her best friend raised an eyebrow. "Sure. But I'd be careful if I were you. You wouldn't want your crush to fall in love with the mysterious foreigner and then move to England with her to pursue their love." Alya laughed, but Marinette just glared at her. "I'm joking. His dad would never let him leave the country."

Marinette punched Alya in the arm half-jokingly. "They're just friends," she said.

"Yeah, I know. Why are you so worried about Annabelle anyway? She said it's only a cold. She should be in tomorrow."

Marinette didn't know how to respond.

She kept thinking about Annabelle for the rest of the day. She really didn't know how to feel about her. Even though she had stolen a miraculous, Annabelle didn't seem to have any mal intent and both her and Cat Noir have show that she only wants to help. Even Master Fu didn't seem annoyed about it. The whole class seemed to trust her as well, especially Adrien. It kind of made Marinette want to trust her too, but she help being on guard around her.

In the evening after she got home, she went out to her balcony and leaned against the railing. "What do you think Tikki? Is it weird that Annabelle suddenly became sick within the space of five minutes?"

"I don't think she could've got sick within five minutes. Maybe she wasn't feeling great all day and it just got worse after the fight with Fabler. Something similar has happened with you before," her kwami replied.

"Yeah, I guess..." she said, but it didn't help to curb her suspicion.

She noticed Cat Noir in the distance. She often saw him roaming around the streets of Paris and when she asked him about it, he told her he did it because he liked the freedom it gave him. She never questioned it after that and wasn't about to then either. But then she saw him going to Annabelle's window again.

"That's the second time now. Why does he keep going round Annabelle's?"

Tikki noticed as well and they both watched him. It took a while before he was let in.

"Something's going on between those two."

Tikki wanted to tell Marinette that she was just being paranoid, but they couldn't help but find it strange too.

* * *

Adrien had ignored Plagg when they told him this was a bad idea and transformed into Cat Noir. Something was wrong with Annabelle and he wanted to help her. He rushed over to her house and leaned against her bedroom window and tapped on the glass, as he did the other night. He knew she was in there because the light was on, but nothing happened.

He tapped on the glass again and saw her look at the window from her bed. She looked surprised that he was there, but didn't move to get up and let him in. He saw Ziggy say something to her, but he couldn't make out what they were saying. Eventually, Annabelle got out of bed and opened the window.

"What are you doing here?" She sounded slightly annoyed.

"I'm here to check up on you. You've been ignoring me all day."

She looked down. "You should go home. I'm fine. It's just a cold. You'll probably catch it if you come inside."

"She's lying," Ziggy said from behind her. "She's actually bunking off because-"

Annabelle grabbed her kwami and covered their mouth with her hand. "Shut up, Ziggy."

She turned around to say something to Cat Noir, but saw he was already entering through the window. She let go of Ziggy and tried to close the window to stop him, but it was being held open by his stick and he entered with ease.

She sighed in defeat. "Just go home. I'm fine."

"No, you're not," Ziggy said.

Annabelle shot them a glare. "Zip it."

"You've been crying all day because you're scared Lila's going to kill you," they scoffed. "She's not even akumatised anymore."

"You were there when she was Fabler. I genuinely thought she was going to slit my throat. And when we got back to class she was glaring at me like she wanted to kill me and she was holding a pen," she yelled back.

They rolled their eyes. "A regular pen. You're being melodramatic."

"She sits directly behind me. What if she does something without me knowing? What if-"

"Is this true?" Annabelle was cut off by Cat Noir.

She forgot he was there. She didn't know how to reply. "I... um..." She turned to Ziggy, who only gave her the look she was expecting. She sighed, looking down. "Yes, it's true..."

Cat Noir didn't know how to respond. He looked at Annabelle for a while before turning his gaze to the ground as well. He knew Lila was intimidating and he'd been put in life threatening situations before when dealing with akumas, but it had become normal to him. Everything was all still new to Annabelle. It made sense that she would be scared. He was annoyed at himself that he didn't realise sooner. It was highly unlikely that Lila would actually kill Annabelle, but he knew it probably wasn't a good idea for them to sit near each other.

He finally looked up. "I can talk to Lila, if you want, and ask her to leave you alone."

She finally met his gaze. "Really?"

Cat Noir smiled. "Yeah, I'm not sure if she'll listen to me though, but it's worth a shot." He paused. "And we could probably ask someone to swap seats with you. I'm sure Mylenne would want to sit next to Ivan."

Annabelle smiled. "Thank you, Adrien. I really appreciate it."

It threw him off a bit hearing his real name for the first time when transformed, but he smiled back anyway and moved forwards to hug her. She was surprised at first, but then wrapped her arms around him tightly. Her head was nestled in his chest and when she breathed in, she couldn't help thinking about how nice he smelled. She held onto him tighter. She didn't want to let go.

"Oh my god, get a room."

They abruptly stopped hugging after hearing Ziggy say that. Cat Noir was blushing slightly, but Annabelle's face was completely red. She felt exactly how she did when she hid him in her bed and remembering that made her even redder. Ziggy was quick to comment on this.

"Even your ears are red," they said.

"Shut up," Annabelle hissed.

"What?" Cat Noir looked at the two of them.

She wasn't sure how it was possible but she blushed even harder. "Nothing."

He shrugged and brushed it off. "So, are you gonna come into school tomorrow."

Annabelle groaned. She really didn't want to have to see Lila again, but she knew she couldn't keep skipping school. "Fine. But you have to promise to talk to Lila."

"I will." He smiled and she smiled back. "But if I get to school tomorrow and you're not there I'll drag you there myself."

Her facial expression changed and she looked annoyed. "Don't you dare. It was so embarrassing when you carried me back to school yesterday."

Cat Noir laughed. "There won't be a problem if you turn up tomorrow, sheep girl."

Annabelle blushed slightly when he called her that, just like when Viperon did the same. She must find the nickname embarrassing, that had to be it. But a small part of her knew it wasn't.


	16. Cutting Class

**Chapter Sixteen - Cutting Class**

Annabelle had been trying to put off going to school for as long as she could. She kept talking to Adrien for as long as she could the night before in an attempt to put off the morning and hope that he'd be too tired to drag her into school, but Ziggy caught on and told him to go home at 1am. Then she wasted time mindlessly scrolling on her phone until her kwami took it away and changed the password, saying that she could change it back after she went to school.

She still couldn't sleep. She probably only slept for two hours, maybe less. She was too anxious. She trusted Adrien wholeheartedly, but that still didn't change how she felt about Lila. She was still scared.

She was already awake when her alarm was going off and she waited a while before stopping it. Then she curled up in her bed and buried herself deeper into the covers.

"You have to go to school," Ziggy said bluntly. "I don't think Cat Noir was joking last night and he'd probably drag you there even if you were in your pyjamas."

Annabelle groaned. "I know. But I still don't want to."

Her dad walked in at that moment and Ziggy quickly hid somewhere he wouldn't see them. "Anna, are you feeling any better today?"

Annabelle sat up and smiled. "Yeah, I am. I think I'm gonna go to school today. If I start to feel worse again though, I'll probably just go home."

She felt Ziggy pinch the back if her neck hard, telling her that wasn't going to happen.

Her dad smiled. "That's good. Call me when you get home, even if you don't go home early." He paused. "I might not be able to answer it though, but just leave a voicemail. Anyway, I've got to go to work now, so I'll see you later."

She frowned. "Already?" It was 7am and when he first started he had to go in at 9am. He was getting home later and later each night as well.

"Yeah, there's a big project going on and they need me to be in early because I'm leading it. I'll probably be home late as well, so don't wait for me to eat in the evening."

She sighed. "Ok, bye."

Her dad waved and left the room, closing the door behind him. He looked exhausted. She knew that they moved because his new job was a big improvement from his old one, but she'd barely seen him the whole time they'd been in France. He'd leave when she woke up and get back when she was asleep on weekdays and then he'd stay in bed all day at the weekend. Annabelle was starting to doubt whether they should've moved or not.

"Now that you've said you're going to school, get up and actually go to school," Ziggy said as soon as her dad left the room.

Annabelle sighed. "But I don't really want to."

Her kwami glared back at her. "Fine. I'll go tell Plagg that Adrien's gonna have to drag you-"

She didn't let them finish their sentence as she leaped out of bed. "I'm up, ok. I'm up."

* * *

Annabelle was going as slowly as she possibly could, from having an extra long shower to eating her cereal so slowly that it went soggy and making her five minute walk take closer to fifteen. Even with all her procrastination, she still turned up on time with ten minutes before her first class.

Adrien was waiting for her outside the school steps and smiled when he saw Annabelle walking towards him. She glared at him, but he didn't stop smiling.

"Good thing I don't have to drag you in today," he said.

"Shut up."

He laughed and walked in with her. She saw Lila as soon as she stepped in and froze. She wanted to run but couldn't move. Then Lila noticed her and glared right through her. When she saw Annabelle's reaction, she smiled. Adrien noticed and squeezed Annabelle's shoulder and she snapped out of it.

"Annabelle, it's ok. Don't worry. She isn't going to do anything," he said.

She breathed in deeply and breathed out. "Did you talk to her?"

He nodded, then sighed. "I only told her about what happened in school, not about," he turned his voice to a whisper, "Black Sheep and she said she wouldn't do anything, but..." he trailed off.

"What?" She asked, looking worried.

He sighed again. "It's hard to tell if she's being genuine or not. Let's hope she is."

She nodded and he smiled. Then Annabelle realised that Adrien's hand was still on her shoulder and felt herself blushing. She pushed his hand off her.

"Well I'm gonna go speak to Ivan, Alix and Mylenne now," she said, trying to be nonchalant and failing miserably.

She walked away quickly with her head down. What is wrong with me? She kept asking herself, but felt like she already knew the answer.

Asking to swap seats with Mylenne was easy enough. She told them that she found it hard to see the board sometimes, which wasn't a complete lie. She had needed glasses in the past, but after she lost them her optician told her that she was fine without them since her prescription wasn't too wrong in the first place. But she was starting to think that she needed them again because her eyes had started hurting again. She was planning to get her eyes tested with her dad, but he was always either too busy or too tired to go.

Mylenne was perfectly fine with sitting next to Ivan and had wanted to for a while, but didn't want Alix to be left alone, so Annabelle's suggestion had actually worked out for the best. They would all talk to Miss Bustier at the start of class to check that it was ok, but they doubted she'd find a problem with it.

There were only a few minutes before the bell rang and class started. Annabelle was starting to panic. What if Miss Bustier didn't let her move seats? What if Lila asked to swap seats with Max or Kim so she would still be behind her? What if Lila wasn't being genuine with Adrien and wasn't going to leave her alone?

Adrien noticed her walking towards the locker room and remembered the time she spent an entire lesson inside her own locker. He quickly caught up to her and grabbed her arm, causing her to yelp.

"Where are you going?" He asked.

Annabelle started at him for a while. He could tell she was about to make up an excuse. "The toilet, where else? Tell Miss Bustier I might be late."

He didn't believe that she was actually going to come back to class so he spoke to Ziggy. "Make sure she doesn't spend the whole lesson in her locker again."

Annabelle blushed, feeling embarrassed as soon as that memory resurfaced.

"I'll drag her to class if I have to," Ziggy said.

Annabelle glared at both of them and sighed. "I'll definitely turn up. I promise," she lied.

Adrien sighed, believing her. "Fine. I'll tell Miss Bustier where you are."

Annabelle quickly headed in the opposite direction to everyone else and into the locker room. What did it matter if she didn't turn up to class? It's not like Adrien or Ziggy could do anything. Ziggy was the size of her thumb and Adrien couldn't go into the girls toilets.

* * *

Marinette couldn't stop thinking about how Cat Noir had been to see Annabelle twice now. She knew something had to be going on and she felt the same suspicion when she saw her hanging out with Adrien.

It was difficult to convince herself that it wasn't just her jealousy telling her to question it, but within a few days they had become inseparable. They were always together whenever she saw either of them and she didn't even remember seeing Adrien hang out with Nino this much.

Yesterday when at the end of the day, Marinette overheard Adrien saying to someone that he would check on Annabelle after school and offered to give her his notes from class two days in a row, which she found strange. His father would never let him go round someone's house normally, but she especially couldn't imagine it happening if they were ill and Adrien could catch it. Also Marinette knew he had his fencing and Chinese lessons yesterday and wouldn't have the time to go round Annabelle's. But he seemed so certain when he said it.

Marinette felt like these two things were connected somehow, but she couldn't work out how. Adrien didn't have any connection to Cat Noir. It didn't make any sense.

* * *

Annabelle hadn't left her toilet cubicle for five minutes now. She was sitting against the door on her phone, trying to ignore Ziggy telling her to go class.

"Everyone knows you're in today. You can't stay in here forever," they said.

"I'll just tell them I went to the infirmary because I wasn't feeling great," she replied bluntly.

Ziggy rolled their eyes and sighed. "I don't get it. You won't even be sitting in front of her anymore. What's the problem?"

Annabelle looked at her kwami directly. "That doesn't solve everything. I'm still scared of her." She started to breathe heavily, not breaking eye contact for a while before she turned her head away and started at the floor. "And anyway, you heard Adrien. It's impossible to tell whether she's being genuine or not. Plus she'll know the reason I change seats was because of her." She sighed.

Ziggy didn't know what to say. They didn't realise how much Lila had scared her. They'd never seen her look so deflated. From what they had seen, Annabelle was usually more optimistic than this. They didn't know what to do.

"You can't keep skipping classes. You're going to have to go at some point," they said, flying down to their owner's shoulder.

She sighed. "I know. I just need to calm down and then I'll go. Just give me five more minutes."

"Ok," Ziggy smiled. "But after that I'm dragging you to class myself."

Annabelle snorted. "What are you gonna do? You're the size of my thumb."

"I'm actually closer to the size of your whole hand."

"Wow, that really makes a difference."

The two of them talked until the second the five minutes was up and Ziggy told her to go back to class. Even though she still didn't want to, she left the cubicle and left the toilets. She was going to go to class, but then she bumped into Luka who was lying on the bench in the locker room humming to himself. He stopped when he heard her approaching, thinking a teacher had caught him, but smiled when he saw who it was. Annabelle blushed slightly.

"Shouldn't you be in class?" He asked, his smile changing to a smirk.

"I could say the same to you," she quipped. She could hear Ziggy telling her to go to class, but ignored them.

"I have physics and Miss Mendeleev doesn't particularly like me and I don't particularly like her or physics, so I decided to bunk off. What about you?"

"Oh, um... I..." Annabelle wasn't sure whether to tell him the truth or not. "I'm just trying to avoid someone."

Luka looked worried. "Who? Is something wrong?"

"It doesn't matter. It's nothing. I'm just overreacting about something," she said, deciding he probably didn't want to know anyway.

But his response told her otherwise. "You can tell me. I promise I won't tell anyone." He placed a hand on her shoulder, making her blush deepen and she looked down.

"I..." She began, but couldn't finished. She didn't really want to talk about it.

"It's ok. You don't have to if you don't want to, but I'll be willing to listen if you are."

She looked up and met his sincere eyes. He gave her a comforting smile, which she returned with a weaker one.

"Thanks, Luka. I appreciate it."

"No problem." He patted her shoulder before returning his hand to his side. "I might not know exactly what's going on, but I can show you somewhere to hide since you're trying to avoid someone."

"Really?"

He nodded and started to head out of the locker room. Annabelle was about to follow him when she heard Ziggy hiss into her ear:

"Go to class."

She paused and sighed. "Actually, I should probably go back to class." Even if she meant it as a lie when she said it, she did still promise Adrien and Ziggy.

Luka frowned. "Well, if you have to." Then he thought for a moment and smiled. "But you've already missed," he looked at the clock on the wall, "15 minutes. What's another 45?"

Annabelle looked at him in disbelief and smiled. "I didn't realise before, but you can be a terrible influence when you want to be."

He laughed. "Juleka's told me something similar before."

* * *

Luka took Annabelle to the music department, which was currently empty. There weren't any classes going on and there wasn't any sign of a teacher either.

"That's weird," Luka said, looking around. "Normally she's here."

"Who?" Annabelle asked.

"Miss Vidal, the music teacher. It doesn't matter though, the practice rooms should be unlocked." He walked towards the music store cupboard and took out his guitar.

"Isn't it better for her not to be here? Aren't we gonna get caught."

He smirked. "Nah, she lets me stay here whenever I want. I got kicked out a few times, but normally it's ok." He opened the door to the last practice room in the corridor and held it open for Annabelle.

The room was quite small with only a piano, music stand and a chair in it. She sat down on the chair in the corner while Luka took the piano stall and began to take his guitar out.

"If I remember correctly, you told me you played the cello, right?" He asked.

She was surprised he remembered. She couldn't help but feel happy about that. "Yeah, I've been playing since I was about seven, I think."

He chuckled to himself. "I'm surprised you'd be big enough to play a cello that young."

She smiled. "Well, it's not too hard if you have a high enough stool. But I was about the size of my first cello when I started playing. What about you? When did you start playing the guitar?"

He looked thoughtful and smiled. "I can't remember. I don't think I've ever not played the guitar." They laughed. "Didn't you say that you could play the guitar?"

She looked down, slightly embarrassed and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. "Only a little bit and I'm not that good."

"I'm sure that's not true. Show me what you can play." He handed her the guitar and she looked at him like he was crazy.

"Are you sure? I can only play two songs."

He smiled. "Go ahead."

Reluctantly she took the guitar and started to play a basic chord progression she learned a while ago. Occasionally her fingers would slip, causing her to get even more embarrassed.

_I bet he's judging me,_ she thought to herself as she finished. But to her surprise, when she looked up at him he was just smiling. It didn't even seem like he was trying to contain any laughter. It seemed like he actually enjoyed it.

"I told you I'm not that good." She tucked some hair behind her ear again and handed him his guitar back.

"It's fine. We all have to start somewhere and I kinda liked it."

She blushed.

"Would you ever consider joining my band?" He asked.

Annabelle remembered hearing them play when she first met Luka a few weeks ago. She couldn't tell if he was being serious or not.

"There's no way you'd get me to play guitar and I doubt you'd ever really need a cello, so probably not," she said.

"Well if we ever write a song that sounds like it would need a cello part I'll let you know."

She blushed even more.

Luka looked pensive for a moment as he looked at Annabelle. "It's seemed like you've had something like this in your heart for a while."

_Wait, what? What the hell does that mean?_ She thought to herself before he started to play something. It wasn't quite sad, but felt melancholic and sounded slightly discordant. It didn't make much sense to her, but she knew exactly what he meant.

He stopped and looked at her. "Do you want to tell me what's wrong? You still don't have to if you don't want to."

She wasn't too keen about talking about Lila again, but she'd never been serenaded with her own feelings before and felt like she could trust him. She sighed and told him everything, obviously leaving out the parts about her being a superhero. The whole time she was telling him she looked at the ground, avoiding looking him in the eye. After she told him, she was still looking at the ground, but looked up as soon as he said something.

"I can understand why you'd want to avoid her, but I don't think you should keep skipping class to do it."

She raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that a bit hypocritical, given what we're doing right now?"

He laughed. "I'm failing physics anyway, might as well fail in style."

Annabelle started laughing as well, which made Luka smile as she had seemed to cheer up slightly.

"What I mean is that the more you keep avoiding her, the worse things are going to seem. You're building it up in your head, when in reality it probably isn't as bad as it seems."

She thought about it for a moment. All Lila had been doing was glare at her and when she got scared the first time, Lila was only holding a pen. Even if she was plotting her revenge, there wasn't much she could really do.

"It's ok if you're still scared of her though. I don't really like her anyway," Luka said.

"Really? Everyone seems to be in love with her, except for Marinette and Adrien."

He shrugged. "She's kind of annoying."

She smiled. "Thanks, Luka."

He smiled back. "It's ok. Do you want to head back to class now?"

She looked at her watch. "Well, we've already missed half an hour, what's another one."


	17. Growing Suspicion

**Chapter Seventeen - Growing Suspicion**

Annabelle and Luka stayed in the practice room until they heard the bell for the end of class. When they left, they bumped into Miss Vidal.

"Hello, Luka. Was it physics again?" She asked him.

"Yeah," he said. "Don't tell Miss Mendeleev."

"My lips are sealed," she said with a wink. Then she noticed Annabelle. "Oh, you brought someone with you this time. Is she in your class, as well? I get it. I don't like Miss Mendeleev either."

"No we just bumped into each other," he said.

"I was skipping my class too and Luka told me we could hide in here," Annabelle said.

The music teacher smiled. "Well, you're welcome in here whenever you want. But don't skip class too often or you'll end up like him."

"Hey!"

Luka and Miss Vidal laughed. Annabelle just stood there awkwardly. The two of them seemed like good friends, which made her feel out of place.

"Well anyway, you two better not skip anymore classes today. Especially you," Miss Vidal pointed at Luka. "You've been in here everyday this week and if your mother finds out I've been letting you do it, she'll kill me."

"Ok, I won't." He smiled. "Bye, Julie."

She waved as he and Annabelle left. "Say hi to Anarka for me and it's Miss Vidal in school."

"Right, sorry."

Luka closed the door to the music department and Annabelle looked at him quizzically.

"What?" He asked.

"You seem like you know her," she paused, realising that sounded stupid. "Outside of school, I mean."

"She's my mum's childhood friend. She's basically like my aunt."

She smiled. "That's nice."

They walked up the stairs towards Annabelle's classroom. They paused outside before she went in.

"Thanks for helping me out, Luka."

"It's no problem."

She looked at his blue eyes and her heart started beating faster. His gaze was intense, but kind and she could feel heat start to rise to her cheeks again. She quickly looked down.

"I should, uh, go in," she said, putting her hand on the door handle.

"See you around, Annabelle." He began walking to his classroom, but stopped after a few steps and turned around. "If you ever want to bunk off again, just let me know. I'd be glad to join you." He winked at her and carried on walking.

Annabelle's face turned red. She breathed deeply to calm herself down and then walked into the classroom. As soon as she entered, everyone turned to look at her. Lila rolled her eyes dismissively when she saw who it was and turned away, making Annabelle feel even calmer. Maybe she was just overthinking and Lila wasn't that scary after all.

"Sorry I missed class, Miss Bustier. I started to feel dizzy so I went to the infirmary to lie down." Annabelle already had that excuse planned since this morning because she wasn't going to turn up originally.

Miss Bustier smiled and looked understanding. "That's ok, Annabelle. If you're still not feeling well, you can go home."

"No it's fine. I'm feeling better now." She was suddenly aware of how strongly Adrien was glaring at her from his seat, obviously not believing her. She bit her lip and ignored it.

"Mylenne told me you wanted to swap seats with her because you're struggling to see the board sometimes. Is that correct?"

"Uh, yeah. I'm going to get my eyes tested at the weekend, but it would help me out for now."

Annabelle rubbed the back of her neck and briefly glanced over to her old seat, where Mylenne was now sitting. She looked happy to sit next to Ivan. Then she saw Lila behind her, smirking, and she quickly looked away. Clearly Lila didn't believe her either.

"Well then, take your new seat next to Alix."

Annabelle smiled and walked to sit in her new seat. Adrien eyed her as she walked past his desk, but she kept on ignoring him. She could already tell he was going to have a go at her at break.

* * *

When class was over and break had started, Annabelle tried to slip past Adrien, using the crowd of her class to go unnoticed. But she felt him grab her arm and pull her back when she tried to go through the door.

"How was the infirmary?" He asked rhetorically, clearly annoyed.

"I wasn't going to skip the whole class," she paused. "Well, I was originally, but-"

He sighed and leaned against a desk, cutting her off. "You promised you wouldn't."

Annabelle looked at the ground. "Ok, so that might've been a lie." Adrien rolled his eyes. "But, Ziggy did convince me and I was about to, but then I bumped into Luka in the locker room."

"Luka? What was he doing in there?"

"He was skipping his lesson too and then we hung in a practice room until the bell rang." She sighed. "I know I lied earlier and I really am sorry about that, but," she looked him dead in the eye, "I promise I won't skip anymore lessons because of Lila."

Annabelle looked sincere and Adrien wanted to believe her. He sighed.

"Do you actually mean it this time?"

She nodded. "Luka told me that the longer I put it off, the more it will build up in my head, when in reality it probably isn't as bad as I think it is and he was right. Lila isn't really that scary, she's just quite annoying."

He laughed, then sighed. "Ok, I believe you. But if you do it again, I will start dragging you to school myself."

She froze and stared at him. "You are joking, right? You're not gonna do that, right?"

He just smiled without responding and began to leave the classroom. She followed closely behind.

"Adrien, please tell me you're joking. You're not gonna do that. If you think I'll let you, then you're wrong."

They both started to laugh. They were too busy paying attention to each other that they didn't notice Marinette staring at them as they left the classroom.

* * *

"Something's definitely going on with them Tikki," she said on her way home from school. "I don't know what it is, but there just has to be."

Today, like most days, Annabelle and Adrien were seemingly inseparable.

"They might just be close friends, Marinette. It's not that suspicious. Maybe you're just jealous," her kwami responded teasingly.

Marinette became flustered. "I am not jealous. It's just they went from barely talking to each other to best friends all of a sudden. There has to be some other reason to it."

Tikki sighed. "They became close around the time they did that project together. Maybe they just realised they had a lot more in common than they thought."

"Maybe, but what about Cat Noir meeting Annabelle two times now. You can't tell me that isn't suspicious."

"Cat Noir sometimes meets you on your balcony, are you saying that's suspicious too?"

"No, that's different because," Marinette paused. She never found it weird because it was Cat Noir, but he didn't know she was Ladybug or at least she didn't think he knew. He knew that Annabelle was Black Sheep. Maybe they were just friends too. Maybe she was just overthinking things.

She sighed. "Maybe you're right, Tikki. I might just be being paranoid. But I do still find it a bit weird."

"Well I actually said jealous but-"

"Tikki, shut up!"

They both laughed. Really, Tikki did find it suspicious. She knew that Adrien and Cat Noir were one in the same, but she couldn't tell that to Marinette and there was no way that Annabelle knew that, right?

* * *

Marinette was on her balcony, sketching out some ideas. Every so often, she would look over in the direction of Annabelle's house. She knew that Cat Noir had visited her twice, but those were only the times she knew about. There was a chance they might've done it more than that.

She knew that Tikki told her not to be suspicious, but she couldn't help it. Although Annabelle had proven herself to be a nice person and actually be useful as Black Sheep, she still didn't completely trust her. Maybe she was just being jealous over Adrien, even if she didn't admit it, but why did she feel the same about that as she did about this. She couldn't be getting jealous over Cat Noir, could she?

She sighed. "I guess he isn't coming tonight."

"Who isn't coming tonight?"

Marinette jumped when she heard a voice come from behind her and fell of her chair. She turned around and looked up. It was Cat Noir. _Speak of the devil_, she thought to herself.

He jumped down from the roof and helped her up. "Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you, Marinette. Are you ok?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," she said, dusting herself down. "What are you doing here?"_ Why are you with me and not Annabelle?_

"Well, I was roaming around the streets of Paris, like the stray cat that I am," he posed dramatically and she rolled her eyes, " and it crossed my mind that it had been a while since I last visited my Princess."

Marinette could feel heat rising to her cheeks when he said that. She couldn't deny that she was glad that he decided to meet her instead of Annabelle. But why was she reacting like this? She couldn't be jealous about Cat Noir.

"Why do you always call me that?" She asked, ignoring her thoughts.

"What?"

"Your 'Princess'." It always reminded her of how he called her 'his Lady' as Ladybug, but at least it was obvious where that came from.

Cat Noir thought about it for a while and shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe it's because when your dad got akumatised I had to be your knight in shining armour, coming to rescue you, the princess locked away in a tower of vines."

Marinette snorted and rolled her eyes. He'd called her that since long before then, so she knew she wouldn't get a proper answer out of him. And although the reminder of when she pretended to go out with him had her internally cringing, she brushed it off.

"So how have you been, Princess? Did you ever sort out that problem with the new girl?" Cat Noir asked.

She forgot she told him that and she was surprised he remembered. "Oh yeah..." She leaned on the balcony railing. "Kind of? She actually managed to help out a bit with... um... that school project, but she couldn't help out as much as she wanted to and," she sighed, "I'm still not sure about how I feel about her."

He tilted his head. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know. I still can't seem to trust her. She seems nice, but she reminds me of someone else that I know. What if she only helped out to get close to me now so that I'll ask for her help again and she... uh... sabotages the project? I know I'm probably overreacting but-"

She stopped as soon as she heard Cat Noir laugh. She looked at him annoyed and confused.

"What?" She snapped.

"Nothing, it's just," he paused to calm down his breath, "you're being awfully dramatic over a school project."

Marinette didn't know what to say. She probably did seem dramatic to him, but she couldn't tell him the truth and give away her secret identity. Maybe she was being dramatic anyway.

He continued. "Anyway, I don't think it's a good idea to judge her like that before you actually get to know her. Maybe you should just talk to her and let her help you out if she wants to. Not everyone's out to get you."

Once again, he was right. Cat Noir always gave such good advice to her as Marinette. She wished he would be this useful when she was Ladybug, but he was always too busy flirting with her to do that.

"Thanks, Cat," she said.

He turned to face her. "No problem, Princess."

They stood in silence for a while before Marinette spoke. "Why do you do this?"

"Do what?"

"Meet me on my balcony. Surely you'd rather spend your time doing more interesting superhero things. I mean if _I_ were a superhero, I wouldn't want to spend my time transformed hanging out with my friends. I can just do that anyway."

He looked a little sad when she said that, but she couldn't work out why. He shrugged. "I don't know. I just..." He sighed. "When I'm transformed, I can do whatever I want to do and go wherever I want. I can't always do that in my normal life and sometimes it's just nice to talk to a friend, even as a superhero."

Once again, Marinette was at a loss for words.

"Anyway, what's with all the questions tonight? Is this an interrogation?" He asked, then he smirked. "Or were you just curious?"

She rolled her eyes, knowing what he was doing. "I'm not saying it."

"You're not saying what?"

She shook her head. "Don't play dumb. I know what you're trying to do."

"I honestly have no idea what you're talking about. What aren't you gonna say?"

Marinette started to laugh and Cat Noir followed suit. He smiled, but still felt slightly sad. He wished that she would act the same around him as Adrien, but she always seemed less confident and uncomfortable. Alya and Nino had told him that she didn't hate him, but sometimes it was hard to believe. That was another reason why he liked visiting her as Cat Noir because she acted around him the way she did around everyone else, but he couldn't tell her that.

But then again, he always had to keep up appearances as Adrien, so he couldn't exactly blame her. Sometimes it really did seem as if Cat Noir was his true self while Adrien was his alter ego.

"Cat Noir?"

"Huh?" He snapped out of his thoughts and looked at Marinette.

"You zoned out for a bit. Are you alright?"

"Yeah," he lied. "I'm fine."


	18. Not an Update (Please Read)

**I understand that a lot of people have been reading and enjoying this story, but, unfortunately, I've decided to give up on it. I originally came up with this idea a while ago when they first introduced the concept of more miraculous into the show and I tried writing it then, but gave up and deleted it (as I've done with all of my previous fanfictions lol). I tried writing this again last year because I thought it would be something fun to do on the train to college, but got too busy and picked it up again during lockdown. As much as I would like to continue with it, as I have a fully fleshed out plan for it, I can't find any real motivation for it and have kind of written myself into a corner.**

**Although I do have an overall plan, I keep introducing new ideas and never develop them as far as I could and I fell like I have too many loose ends and I'm not happy with what I'm writing. This has been fun and as much as I would like to finish this story, it's hard to continue something I have little motivation to do. This was always something I've never taken particularly seriously from the start, so I feel like this was always going to happen.**

**I am, however, planning on starting a new project still related to "Miraculous Ladybug". As many fans are, I'm with how season three was done and have little faith in the future of the show, as characters have shown little development and the plot is still quite minimal and has little impact on the show overall. Since watching a few lot of videos on "Miraculous" (these videos by Fallen Gale /JePDL981gpA /ZndT4AOfWG0 and this video by ordinary dreamer /ZRmYiwwZkNw in particular) I've decided to write a fanfiction where I rewrite the show from the beginning.**

**I'm sorry if you were enjoying this story and were looking forward to seeing it through to the end, but I don't want to put something out that I'm not happy with, even if it's just a fanfiction idea I came up with when I was 15 that I picked up again because I was bored. Hopefully I'll have the first chapter of my new fanfic ready either by the end of next week, but I am going to take this one more seriously than the other ones I've written in the past.**

**Below is the start of the next chapter I was writing, but I couldn't work out how to finish it. If anyone would like to try to rewrite or continue this story, I don't mind so long as you credit me in some way. I would be happy to read it :).**

* * *

**Chapter Eighteen - Homesick**

Annabelle noticed that Adrien had seemed off today. It was hard not to notice. He kept zoning out in class and he was even doing it lunch. She'd said his name a few times, but he didn't seem to notice. She kicked his leg under the table, which seemed to get his attention.

"Ow, Annabelle, what was that for?" He asked, rubbing his leg.

"You zoned out again. You've been doing it all day. Did something happen last night?"

He didn't answer, just looked down and started to zone out again. Annabelle rolled her eyes and kicked him in the other leg.

"Hey! Quit doing that." He glared at her and she glared back.

"Just be glad I'm kicking your legs and not anywhere else."

He glared at her, then sighed. "Anyway, nothing happened. I'm fine."

She rolled her eyes again and groaned. "I'm not buying that for a second." She got up and grabbed Adrien by the wrist, dragging him out of the cafeteria.

"Annabelle, what are you doing? I hadn't even finished my lunch yet," he said, trying to wrench his wrist out from her grip, but her hand wouldn't budge.

"Something's clearly wrong and you're gonna tell me what it is." She said, continuing to pull him in the direction of the locker room.

He gave up on trying to get his wrist back. Her grip was surprisingly too strong. When they got to the locker room, she sat down on one of the benches and gestured for him to do the same.

"So, what is it?" She asked.

"I told you it's nothing. I'm fine." He sighed. "Anyway, if you really think something's wrong, don't you think you're being a bit too blunt about it?"

She raised an eyebrow. "First of all, still not buying it and second, you were exactly like this to me when I wouldn't go to school."

Adrien wanted to argue with her, but knew she was right and it would make him sound like a hypocrite if he did.

He sighed. "It's Marinette. It's been bugging me for a while, but I don't think she likes me. Whenever I see her or try to talk to her, she always seems uncomfortable or tries to avoid me. Alya and Nino have told me that she doesn't hate me, but sometimes it's hard to believe them. I've known her for nearly a year and I've barely had a proper conversation with her once."

Annabelle just started at him. _Is this kid an idiot?_ She thought. _Maybe he just isn't good at noticing this kind of thing._

"Are you sure she doesn't like you and it's not, I don't know, something else?" She asked, hoping he would get what she was hinting at. He didn't.

He shook his head. "She's always so confident around everyone, even Chloé and Lila. She gets on so well with everyone else. It's just me." He sighed. "She only acts like normal around me when I'm Cat Noir."

"What?" She interrupted. "How often are you around her as Cat Noir?"

"Well, I've saved her a few times and sometimes I visit her on her balcony."

"She has a balcony? That's so cool." Annabelle shook her head and focused. "Not the important part. Why do you visit her? Isn't that a bit weird?"

"I visit you all the time as Cat Noir."

"Yeah, but that's different. I know who you are. She doesn't. Doesn't she find it strange that a superhero sometimes randomly joins her on her balcony at night?"

Adrien has never thought about it like that before. He'd always seen her as Marinette, the girl from her class, but she'd never send to find it strange that a superhero would visit her. He'd always enjoyed her company too much to think about it.

"I guess that is a bit weird when you put it like that..." He paused, then smirked. "Anyway, why do you care so much? Are you jealous?" He teased.

"What? No, of course not…" She laughed nervously and averted his gaze. She could feel her cheeks getting warmer again.

He laughed. "I'm only kidding, don't worry,"he said, noticing her discomfort, but clearly misinterpreting it.

Annabelle sighed. She knew she had to sort out her feeling, but didn't want to right now, so she tried to change the subject.

"Is that all that was bothering you, or was there something else? You've seemed a bit out of it for a while now," she asked him.

Adrien looked down and his face turned sombre. He remained silent, but it was very clear that something was on his mind.

"It's ok, you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to." She became worried that she had stumbled onto something she shouldn't have.

"No, it's fine," He responded flatly. "It's just…" He sighed. "I've never told you this before, but a few years ago, my mum disappeared and it's her birthday next week."

Annabelle didn't know what to say. She opened her mouth to speak, but decided it would probably be better if she just stayed quiet and listened.

He continued. "I really miss her and the more I miss her, the more I want to spend time with my father, but… Well, I've already told you that I hardly see him. I just wish that he wasn't so controlling with my life, especially when he's barely even a part of it and I know he probably misses mum just as much as I do, but sometimes it seems like he doesn't care about anything at all."

Tears began to form in his eyes. He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to face Annabelle. She still didn't say anything, but gave him a comforting smile. He smiled back weakly and pulled her into a hug. She was surprised by this and gingerly wrapped her arms around him. She really hoped he couldn't feel her heart beating faster.

"Thank you," he said, hugging her tighter.

"It's ok."

The hug lasted a lot longer than she was expecting and when it started to seem like it wasn't going to end, she decided to say something.

"Do you want to go back to lunch now?"

Adrien pulled away and looked at the time. "Lunch is nearly over. We should probably head to class."

The two of them left the classroom, Annabelle's pulse finally beginning to return to normal. She knew she really needed to get her emotions under control, but that wasn't what her mind was focusing on. Listening to Adrien talk about his parents made her realise how much she missed hers. She was going to say something, but she didn't think it was right to talk about her problems instead of Adrien's. His seemed a lot more serious than hers. She was only a little bit homesick. It wasn't a big deal.

* * *

Adrien decided to take Annabelle's advice. At the end of the day, he decided to talk to Marinette. As per usual, she jumped when she saw him approaching which disheartened him, but he didn't give up.

"Hey Marinette, can I talk to you for a sec?"

She looked at Alya nervously, who smirked and pushed her towards her crush. "Ah! Uh.. yeah sure…"

They moved to somewhere that was out of ear shot from the others before Adrien began to talk. He sighed.

"I know that I've asked you this before and Alya and Nino have told me otherwise, but I just feel like sometimes it seems like you don't like me and I just wanted to ask you if that was true. It's ok if it is, you don't have to spare my feelings."

Marinette just stared at him in shock for a while. It looked like she was trying to say something, but was struggling to form the words.

"Marinette?" He was starting to get concerned.

"I-I… uh… w-what?" She finally stuttered out. "You think I don't like you? W-why?"

"Well, I mean, you always seem so uncomfortable around me, but you're always so much more confident around everyone else, so I thought you must not like me. Is that not true?"

"No! Of course not! I…"

Now seemed like the perfect opportunity to finally confess to him, but Marinette was too nervous and stumbled on her words, saying something intelligible. Adrien looked at her confused and she exhaled, trying to calm herself down. If she didn't do it now, she was never going to find the right time to do it again. She breathed in and out once more and made direct eye contact with her crush.

"Adrien, I like you."

He smiled. "Really?"

She nodded. She was internally screaming at what she had just told him, but trying really hard not to let it show.

"I'm glad that you don't hate me. Sorry, for doubting that we weren't friends."

Marinette's face fell. He didn't understand what he meant. She knew that she needed to correct him, but she felt too dejected to do it.

"Yeah… friends…"

She smiled at him meekly and said goodbye, wishing him a good weekend. As she watched him walk away, she could feel tears forming in her eyes, but tried her best to hold them back until he had gone. She felt like such an idiot.

She felt someone bump into her from behind. It was Annabelle.

"Oh, sorry," she said. "I wasn't looking where I was going... Are you ok, Marinette?"

"I'm fine." She sniffed and pushed her way past her, no longer able to hold back the tears.


End file.
